


r or 






$\ 







^ '' : CD J n ■ ** < *l 















"W 



N 0o. 






O N 



V' aV 



-V 



& 



\^ 



*> <?, 






..V 











•^ 






v 0o^ 
















„s. 






>> 




(O 






v < 














r 







©0 N 















''/■ 0> 



o CT 



'- '%- vV 












o x 















/ '^ 






\° °. 



: 



i 






V 















.0- 



\ ' 



■o 










ft 



THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 



THE RUSSIANS 

AN INTERPRETATION 



BY 



RICHARDSON WRIGHT 

Author of "Through Siberia, an Empire in the Making,' 
"The Open Door," etc. 



You cannot understand Russia by the Intelligence ; 
You cannot measure her by the ordinary foot-rule ; 
She has her own peculiar formation ; 
You can only believe in Russia. 

— TIUTCEEV 




NEW YORK 

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



*1 



Copyright, 1917, by 
Frederick A. Stokes Company 



All Rights Reserved, including translation into foreign languages 






MAY -7 I9!7 

©&A462283 



'■:■ 



TO 
ALBERT JONES FOSTER 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Preface i x 

CHAPTER 

I. The Strength of the Adolescent . . 1 

II. What is a Russian? 20 

III. A Democracy in the Making ... 42 

IV. The Things He Revolts Against ... 65 
V. "This is the Faith of the Fathers" . . 89 

VI. The Moujik's Religion . . . .112 

VII. The Russian as a Business Man . . . 131 

VIII. The Russian as a Working Man . . . 149 

IX. Defining Dostoevsky and Some Others . 177 

X. The Colors on the Russian Palette . . 197 

XI. When Russia Sings 

XII. The Russian Land of Promise 

XIII. Russia's Manifest Destinies 

XIV. Russia and America 
Index 



209 
227 
246 
267 
275 



PREFACE 

It is possible to become quite mad on the subject 
of Russia. In fact, those who are attracted to her 
eventually become either obsessed with enthusiasm for 
all things Russ or embittered with suspicion and hatred. 
They would seem to prove that there was no middle 
course. One cannot take Russia casually; she is too 
big, too fundamental, too promising. She demands 
attention. Her ways are different from the ways of 
most nations. Her viewpoint is of a nature that breeds 
immediate controversy. 

In attempting to steer a middle course through these 
pages I may have failed time and again ; yet a via media 
was my plan. Any interpretation must be made clear 
both to those who are blind to the virtues of the sub- 
ject in hand and those who are blind to its faults. 
Hatred and suspicion of Russia has led some to a com- 
plete denial of her strength or good intentions; en- 
thusiastic obsession has led apologists to a complete 
denial of her weaknesses. To both classes come occa- 
sional awakenings that disrupt preconceived theories. 
Frankly, I have experienced this disenchantment many 
times. Withal, in traveling over the Russian Empire 
and through seven years of constant study in Russian 
affairs, I have had more pleasant awakenings than un- 
pleasant. I have learned to be very slow in formulat- 
ing judgments from newspaper reports or drawing 
quick decisions from a transient situation. 

ix 



x PREFACE 

The deeper I have gone into Russian matters the 
more have I been influenced by the spiritual fact rather 
than by the statistic. Statistics change; the genus is 
permanent. The pageant of a people moves along 
very slowly. Ideals are not born overnight. The 
grand scheme of development is rarely obvious on the 
surface. The destiny is rarely in sight. What Russia 
has been makes her what she is to-day. The mark of 
the potter's thumb is upon her — but you must look 
very closely to see it. 

Americans are people of statistics. We lay great 
store by size and number. We comprehend the ro- 
mance of figures as do few nations. Moreover, we are 
very much concerned with making a living. Russia, 
on the other hand, is just arriving at a comprehension 
of figures, and she is very much more concerned with 
making a life 

It is in the sort of life Russia is attempting to make 
that American interest is greatest. To phrase it col- 
loquially, we are curious to find out what they are 
trying to do over there. But before that question is 
answered, we must understand what the people are 
like, what they believe in, how they go about their 
work, what their ideals are and how closely they are 
coming to them. The statistic may show how the 
wind blows ; the ideals of a people constitute the power 
behind the wind. 

In the following pages I have attempted to interpret 
the why and how of Russian life so that Americans 
can understand what the Russians are trying to do, 
what their present activities presage for the future, and 
how we as a people can establish with the Russians 
an entente cordiale that will have basis in something 



PREFACE xi 

firmer than the fluctuations of commerce or passing 
enthusiasm over the Ballet Russe. 

There is no reason under the sun why the people 
of the greatest republic should not be on friendly terms 
with the people of the greatest autocracy. Between no 
two nations are there so many points of contact — what 
the states possess fitting so snugly into what Russia 
requires. 

The United States will sorely need the friendship of 
alien folk when the war is done. Moreover, in self- 
defense it behooves us to cultivate the Russian people. 
A Russo-Japanese alliance looms all too menacingly on 
the distant horizon. There is no reason for our being 
too proud to be friendly. 

To the fostering of this friendly spirit based on 
mutual understanding and sympathy, these pages are 
devoted. 

Just as I finished these pages the uprising of the 
Douma leaders, expected by those intimately informed 
on Russian affairs, came about. It was, as I had be- 
lieved it would be, practically a bloodless revolution. 
The blow was struck, the end attained, and imme- 
diately those in power devoted their energies to re- 
storing order and furthering the campaigns of the 
armies in the field. 

The blow was struck at the pro-German and Ger- 
man influences at Petrograd, influences which had 
thwarted every movement made by the army from 
the beginning of the war. It terminated German 
power in Russia. It opened to the great Slav Empire 
the opportunity to develop its own future after its 
own fashion. It meant that the forces which had 
worked to suppress and inhibit the people were stopped. 



xii PREFACE 

It forever silenced the rumors of Russia making a 
separate peace with Germany. 

Russia undertook the podvig of revolution ; she must 
now add to that burden by sternly facing the reali- 
ties of reconstruction and further war. Let us hope 
that the hands which guide her destinies will be 
strengthened by the patience and sacrifice of the people 
that they be counseled with wisdom and their acts 
tempered with justice for all. 

What Russia has been makes her what she is to- 
day. We cannot understand the Russia to come until 
we understand what she has been. Read in that light, 
the pages of this book should have a far-reaching influ- 
ence on those who would understand Russia and the 
Russian people. 

I am indebted for the rights of reproduction of cer- 
tain material to the editors of Travel, The Catholic 
World, The Bellman, The Ecclesiastical Review and 
several other magazines. I also wish to take this op- 
portunity to express my appreciation of the kindly 
counsel and criticism proffered by Bassett Digby, Esq., 
of Petrograd and a host of other friends, Russian and 
American, both here and abroad, who have been so 
good as to lend a hand with this book. R. W. 

New York City, 

March 20, 1917. 



THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 



THE RUSSIANS: AN 
INTERPRETATION 



CHAPTER I 

THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 

RUSSIA is a region of extreme cold, where peo- 
ple are jailed for speaking their own minds. 
"It is governed by a bureaucracy that 
grinds down the people. 

"Its population is largely composed of anarchists and 
Jews." 



Take any average American — the proverbial man- 
in- the-street type — propose the subject of Russia, and 
you will be edified by hearing something very like 
these observations on that country. 

And, very likely, there will be a half-apologetic con- 
clusion, — "Well, we Americans don't know much about 
Russia, anyhow." 

The last statement is unquestionably sincere. Amer- 
icans, as a rule, do know little about Russia, despite 
the fact that the Russian flag flies over one-sixth of 



2 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

the earth's land surface, that 182,000,000 souls, repre- 
senting sixty-four racial and tribal divisions, speaking 
150-odd tongues, hold allegiance to the Tsar; despite 
the fact that the individual, as an individual, is freer 
there than in any nation under the sun — circumstances 
which in any other instance would have long since bred 
intimacy between America and Russia. 

Our prejudices are accountable. Russia has been 
geographically isolated. Having an agricultural popu- 
lation and lacking an open port the whole year 
through, its people have only recently crossed the ocean 
to our shores. It is logical that an agricultural people 
should be less widely known than seafaring nations. 

Even when discerned, Russia's national characteris- 
tics are not readily understood. Of the various na- 
tional souls in Europe, none is more difficult to analyze 
than the Russian, none more elusive, none so per- 
sistently defiant to superficial examination and sketchy 
generalizations. 

Moreover, since the late '8o's the world would seem 
to have been subjected to a campaign waged against 
the publication of the truth about Russia. We have 
heard little about that country save its evils. Time 
and again has she been deliberately misrepresented, 
misinterpreted and maligned. Her weaknesses have 
proved fat carrion for ghoulish pens to batten on. 
Some, unfortunately, have believed all the evil told 
of her. Some question. For most of us she remains 
an empire of enigmas. 

With all this weight of prejudice and confusion it 
is surprising how our admiration is quickened when the 
real facts of Russia are presented to us. When we wit- 
ness the artistic fact of the Russian ballet, no words 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 3 

can express our enthusiasm. When we listen to the 
musical fact of Rimsky-Korsakov, Tchaikovsky and 
Arensky, we are speechless with wonder. When we 
read the literary fact of Gogol, Gorky, Dostoevsky, 
Turgenev and Tolstoy, we are held a-marveling. 

But the national contradictions are puzzling. One 
day we read of unbelievable fortunes rolling into the 
coffers of the State through a liquor monopoly; the 
next that it has been given up and the manufacture and 
sale of vodka prohibited throughout the Empire — a 
nation gone dry by the stroke of a pen ! One day we 
read of exiles being scattered to the four corners of the 
globe ; the next, of those exiles coming home to die for 
the very government against which they conspired. 
These paradoxes are only a handful of the multitudi- 
nous phases of the real Russ. Surely then, until we 
know the. truth about the Russian people, it were folly 
to judge them or hope to understand their artistic crea- 
tions and their future place in the great pageant of the 
nations. 

The average American mentioned above is right — so 
far as he goes. Russia is an extremely cold region, 
especially the arctic sections, just as Canada is an ex- 
tremely cold place in winter. 

True, intellectual people by the thousands have been 
jailed for speaking their own minds, when they spoke 
them to what the authorities considered the detriment 
of the people at large. To put it in terms which will 
be developed later on, until the upheaval of March 
1917 revolution has never been the sincere expression 
of the entirety of the Russian peoples. 

True, much of the Government is in the hands of 
bureaucrats, just as is the government of England and 



4 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

of the United States. Any governing power that is 
not actually vested in the people — despite what a con- 
stitution may say — is a government fef bureaucrats, 
whether they represent the Crown or Big Business. 

But the great misconception of Russia comes about 
through judging her by the length of her years and not 
by her capacities. So much of Russia's life has been 
mingled with the East, so much of it spent as a buffer 
against the East, that if we judge her according to 
Western standards, she is just now coming of age. 
Russia is the adolescent of the world. 



As soon as one crosses the frontier into Russia he 
feels the need for making clear distinctions. That the 
country is not as he conceived it, is the first fact to 
impress him. What he has heard about Russia and 
what it actually is may be as wide apart as the poles. 
For one who is studying Russia from a distance, the 
necessity for making these distinctions is even more 
important. 

The first and perhaps most fundamental distinctions 
that have to be made are between Russia and the Rus- 
sian Government; between the class that governs and 
the classes that are governed; between the faith that is 
taught and the faith that is believed, corresponding to 
the three great components of any nation that has an 
autocratic form of government and a state religion. 

Unfortunately, many of us, when we think of Rus- 
sia, think of it in the light of the reputation its govern- 
ment bears. Because the people have suffered lamenta- 
bly in political darkness, we have a feeling that the 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 5 

land must also be shrouded in darkness. Quite the re- 
verse is the case. No nation, save the United States, is 
so economically self-sustaining or possesses such a 
wealth of diversified scenery and manifold natural re- 
sources. From arctic Archangel to the sunny Crimea, 
from Teutonic Poland to the orientalized Pacific mari- 
time provinces — a gigantic expanse of over eight and a 
half million square miles — endless beauty and the evi- 
dences of incalculable natural wealth greet the eye. 

You may go among men who have been exiled and 
have fled to foreign countries, you may talk to the 
humble folk who have come to seek wealth in our cities, 
and with one accord they will tell you that, though they 
hold bitter grievance against the Russian Government, 
they still love the Russland and hope some day to re- 
turn. Nor have I ever found the traveler who has vis- 
ited Russia and not promised himself to go back. There 
is a haunting quality about its scenery, there is an en- 
livening stimulus to be caught from the singular life 
of the people, from the admixture of nationalities and 
tongues, from the varied customs and faiths that the 
frontiers of the empire hold. 

Certainly confusion arises in considering the rela- 
tion between the Russian and his Government. In 
matters of politics the Russian citizen is governed 
and his voice and vote count for little. In matters 
of morals and even in matters of faith he is prac- 
tically left to govern himself. He may be intoxi- 
cated five nights out of the week, or what the Rus- 
sians call a "bitter" drunkard, and no one will 
say aught save that he is a fool and to be pitied. But 
let him talk recalcitrant politics for one night in the 
week, and the gendarmerie will soon attend to his case. 



6 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

So then, such problems as the Finn and the Pole — 
the hyphenates of Russia — are not his problems, nor is 
he concerned with the Jew, save as the Jew touches his 
life to make it difficult. 

II 

Between social strata the differences are clearly de- 
fined. The population can be cross-sectioned much as 
can a layer cake — and the layers are many. Whereas 
previous to the middle of the 20th Century there were 
but two classes — the nobles who owned the land and 
the fnoujiks who farmed it — there have been evolved 
other social classes in the recent course of the economic 
and political development of the country. For a mat- 
ter of fact, Russian law recognizes the following 
classes: — nobility, clergy, privileged burgesses, mer- 
chants, burgesses, partisans and peasants. 

At the head of the social ladder below the royal fam- 
ily stands the nobility. This body is composed of two 
classes, hereditary nobles and life or personal nobles. 
The privilege of personal nobility, which amounts to 
little more than a title, accompanies certain ranks in 
the administrative service, which is graded, after the 
oriental manner, into tchins. Hereditary nobility is 
also automatically attained on becoming a Councilor 
of State in the Civil Service, a colonel in the army and 
a senior captain in the navy; it can also be conferred 
by the Emperor. Certain government offices are re- 
served for the nobility and they enjoy a preponderance 
of seats in the Zemstvos in addition to other privileges ; 
the Marechal de Noblesse in each administrative dis- 
trict being president of the local Zemstvo, or provin- 
cial council, and a majority of seats being allotted them 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 7 

in the Imperial Council (the upper legislative house) 
and the Imperial Douma (the lower house). 

Since the nobility numbers some 600,000, it forms 
an appreciable nucleus, albeit many of them are com- 
mon stock, merely possessors of inherited titles that, 
in many instances, mean little or nothing to-day. Thus 
the noble colonel may dicker with his equally noble 
greengrocer for the common necessities of the day. 
There is a fine democracy about it all. Noblemen will 
be found doing menial tasks — men and women with 
scarcely enough to keep body and soul together, many 
of them, who for all their poverty cherish their honors 
and accept with fine eclat the petty respect shown them 
by their fellows. 

A decisive majority of the aristocracy, however, is 
influential. Moreover an amazing part of it is Teuton. 
And thereby hangs the tale of the unity of the Russian 
masses in this war, for the class that has been influential 
in the past 300 years has gradually been becoming 
either Teuton or Teutonized, and from the Teuton did 
Russia learn many lessons of government that, misap- 
plied, have brought about regrettable wrongs. Much 
of the corruption in the Russian Government to-day 
— commonly known as "the dark forces" — bears the 
stamp, "Made in Germany." 

The clergy as a class do not dominate to-day in the 
manner of previous generations, and comment on them, 
apart from mention in this survey as a class that rep- 
resents one arm of the Government, will be reserved 
for a later chapter. 1 

Although not legally recognized as a class, the 
higher intelligentia form a sufficiently strong body to 

1 See Chapter V. 



8 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

place directly beneath the nobility. They are not al- 
ways people of material wealth, yet they are usually 
possessed of a wealth of learning and appreciation. 
Often they are traveled folk, well read, cultured, firm 
believers in the Orthodox Faith, and generally staunch 
supporters of the existing order. Among them, of 
course, are vigorous recalcitrants, but the majority of 
the higher intelligentia may be said to view the present 
sociological and governmental situations in a calm and 
philosophic frame of mind, strong in the belief that 
when the time is ripe they will be remedied. Without 
question, they are the most stable type of Russian peo- 
ple, patriotic, faithful, believing, living in the light 
of modern thought — not in the darkness as does the 
peasant — and still sincere upholders of Russian ideals. 

In this class fall many of the urban proletariat, fam- 
ilies that have become well-to-do and influential with 
the growth of the cities and the increase of industries. 

Below the intelligentia comes the small bourgeoisie, 
with all the weaknesses of a smug, half-learned middle 
class. 

The rest of the populace — 140,000,000, or 80% in 
all — is moujik, peasant. 

The cultured Russian is practically the same as any 
cultured person the world over. 1 The fact that the 
Dean of the University of Moscow drinks his tea from 
a tumbler, and the president of Harvard drinks his 

1 Unquestionably there are superficial differences. There was the 
young married couple, straight from Petrograd on a honeymoon, who 
came to call the other evening. Both were of the higher intelligentia. 
They had been entertained at one of the fashionable New York wom- 
en's clubs. She was visibly shocked. "You call American women 
cultured!" she exclaimed. "I saw them there, sitting with their legs 
crossed like men, reading newspapers, a cigarette between their lips 
and a high-ball at their elbows." This from a girl whose women- 
folk are supposed to be the most inveterate smokers in the world! 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 9 

from a cup, makes little or no difference in their concep- 
tions of justice, psychology, art or any of those great 
subjects in which cultured people are vitally interested. 
But the peasantry of Russia stands no such comparison 
with a like class in other lands. 

Compared with the peasant of lands under the West- 
ern influence, the moujik makes a very poor showing. 
His level of literacy is low, his capacity for drink 
enormous, and his innate laziness amazing. 1 Com- 
pared with the peasant of those nations in which the 
Oriental influence predominates, the moujik is a su- 
perior being. Thus he may live in a hovel, but it will 
be a fairly clean hovel. His clothes may be dirty, but 
his body will be washed. The weekly bath is almost 
part of the peasant's religion. He loves disorder just 
as the West loves order and efficiency. It is an in- 
justice to judge him by terms foreign to him. Take 
him as he is, and few people afford a more illuminating 
study. For in that great horde of 140,000,000 you 
find the real Russ, unspoiled as yet by Western customs 
and Western philosophy. His problems are the prob- 
lems of Russia. His genius is the soul of Russia. His 
is the class best to know, to understand and to love, 
for in him lies the strength of adolescent Russia. 

1 While the war has changed for the better many of these condi- 
tions — mainly the drunkenness — class habits are not to be overcome 
in so short a time as a few years. During 1913 drunkenness in- 
creased 12^% and the evil effects were felt throughout the empire. 
Since the prohibition of the sale of liquors, marks of prosperity and 
betterment have been evident in a dozen different ways — in the in- 
crease of savings deposits, in the decrease of railroad accidents and 
insanity in the army and in crime. The Russian people find tem- 
perance a great blessing on the whole. If the war has done nothing 
else, it has brought Russia this incalculable boon. 



10 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

III 

There are two genuinely great Russian cities, Mos- 
cow and Kiev. Petrograd is only a French city with 
a Russian veneer and — until the opening of the war — 
a German populace. But Moscow and Kiev are pure 
Russ. 

Enter the church of St. Vladimir at Kiev, and you 
touch the birthplace * of Russia's Christianity — the 
spot where Vladimir and his hosts stepped down into 
the waters of the Dnieper for baptism. Stand within 
the turreted Kremlin walls, and you feel the heart of 
Russia beat, you behold the glory of her dream and see 
the bulwarks of her strength. For the strength and 
the vision and the pulse of the Russ is his religion. 
Grasp that, and you have his secret, you touch his 
intangible genus. 

By no means is the moujik body entirely Orthodox. 
The moujik is as fecund of sects as a Chicago Uni- 
versity professor. There are, beside the Raskolniks — 
the Old Believers — the Mullakons, the Doukoboors and 
a host of others. In dogma they differ little from Or- 
thodoxy, the main lines of divergence being in practice. 
One, two or three generations of dissent are scarcely 
enough to eradicate eight centuries of dogma. More- 
over, while there may be slight differences in dogma, 
there is also the distinction between the faith that the 
moujik is taught to believe and the faith he actually 
does believe. However confusing this problem of 
peasant religion, the fact that he is a religious person is 
the vital factor both to the peasant and to those who 
would attempt to understand him. 

'An ancient Russian hymn runs, "Kiev, Holy Kiev, is the mother 
of towns." 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT n 

Untangle the matted roots, and three main strands 
of the moujik' s religion will be seen : the dogma taught 
him by the Church, the paganism that a life close to 
the soil has bred, and the inherent Orientalism which 
has been brought to the surface under economic and po- 
litical pressure. 

Be he Orthodox or dissenter, the moujik' s religion is 
centered not on the present, but on the farther side 
of the grave. Its symbol is the Resurrection. From 
this present period of suffering Death is the gateway 
to Life. The silver knows the fire that the dross may 
be purged from it. You are made perfect in suffering, 
says the Russ. 

Suffering may be visited upon you or it may be un- 
dertaken voluntarily as a podvig, 1 a great act of self- 
abnegation. However it comes, it is to be accepted 
with resignation. Some of it was visited upon the 
moujik; he was a serf for 400 years, and in many pres- 
ent instances debt and agrarian evils have not permitted 
him to rise much above the level of serfdom. Some of 
it the moujik invites and jolly well deserves for his 
laziness, drunkenness and stupidity. Some of it he 
undertakes of his own accord, hoping for perfection 
thereby. 

Voluntary and involuntary, this class suffering has 
developed, through the generations, the moujik's ca- 
pacity for pity. As with an individual, so with a race ; 
suffering evolves a consciousness, an understanding of 



1 An amusing story of the podvig, "The Devil Chase," was written 
by Nicholas Leskov. It is the tale of a rich merchant who has never 
had any real reason for repentance, and "stages" a Bacchanalian riot 
in a Moscow restaurant which costs him a small fortune, after which, 
satisfied that he has a thoroughly sound basis for repentance, he re- 
tires into a monastery! 



12 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

intangible things not comprehended by those who seek 
conviction by eye and ear alone. 

Pity bred of suffering has still another child — the 
capacity for forgiveness. Because he can understand, 
the moujik can forgive even the worst wrongs against 
him. Because he understands the beggar, he holds the 
beggar sacred — he rouses him to pity and charity. Be- 
cause he, too, has sinned, he can condone excesses and 
lapses from virtue. Because he has known the chains 
of serfdom and suppression, he pities the prisoner, even 
the murderer, calling him "poor fellow." There is 
nothing Pharisaical about his attitude. With true hu- 
mility he confesses to "these bonds." 

Such elements in the moujik'' 's religion have fondly 
been termed "mystical" by some writers. I believe that 
here is a more tangible explanation. His attitude is 
eminently practical, considering the fact that he be- 
lieves the good God looks after his soul in the end. His 
acceptance of wrongs was brought about by the bayonet 
and the knout under the direction of the Government 
and the landowners in the dark days of serfdom. There 
was nothing for him to do but accept. An Oriental 
strain in his blood quickened his capacity for resigna- 
tion. It also gave him the view of Death as the gate- 
way to Life. Besides who would not welcome death 
after such a life? ... As for pity and the capacity 
for forgiveness, these are not virtues restricted to Chris- 
tians; they are logical mental states found the world 
over. Pity, as William Blake aptly observed, has a 
human face. 

From this it must not be inferred that the moujik is 
a funereal fellow. Far from it. His capacity for 
laughter rivals his capacity for vodka. He loves mer- 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 13 

riment as he loves the sun and the wholesome black 
earth. And in this love of sun and earth lies another 
phase of his religion : its indisputable paganism. 

The same moujik who lights a candle in his ikon 
corner at home each morning will sacrifice to the house 
fairies, the domovies, who guard the hearth. The fish- 
erman who nails the ikon at his masthead will pour a 
sacrifice to the water nymphs. In fact, the blessing of 
the water, a yearly ceremony throughout Russia, is 
nothing more than a relic of paganism sanctioned by 
the Church. At a tiny Cossack village on the Amur 
in hinter Siberia I watched this ceremony. It was a 
cold, gray, grim dawn. The entire village, headed by 
priest, cross and banners, trooped down to the river 
bank. There with prayers and incense the waters were 
duly blessed. And then the natives, one by one, bent 
down, worshiped and drank of the muddy stream. 
Some carried jugs of it home to scatter on the fields that 
they might be plentiful. It was beautiful — and it was 
pagan. 

This moujik) then, wears his Christianity like a coat. 
He is an instinctive pantheist. 

At heart he is also an instinctive socialist and an in- 
stinctive revolutionist. These two are due to class 
segregation through the 400 years of serfdom and 
since — segregation that has made him independent as 
a class and communistic in self-defense. The Mir, a 
communistic system of self-government, is a striking 
example of these tendencies which at once strengthen 
and weaken the moujik. 

As a result, he is intensely gregarious and clannish. 
I have noted this especially in Siberia, whither a quar- 
ter of million settlers go each year, a region eminently 



V 



14 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

suited for seeing the peasant "on his own." He lives 
in towns and hamlets. You do not find the solitary 
hut far out in the wilderness as you find settlers in our 
West. He will go out and battle for bread against the 
elements, if he can battle along with his fellows — but 
alone, never. 

Moreover, to this day he fails to understand the 
genuine realities of the classes above him because 
he has never mingled with them and because he has 
so often been exploited by the classes that came 
to mingle with him and his fellows. Sessions of the 
Douma, where all classes meet, bear abundant witness 
both to this gregarious habit of the moujik and to the 
governmental class distinctions mentioned above. In 
addition, the Government has seen to it that the moujik 
stays in his class. 

Some fine results have developed from this class 
segregation; for example, the handicraft work of the 
peasants, the Kustarny, as they are known. Russia 
proper — not including Finland and Poland — has a 
total of not more than 2,500,000 factory hands, but its 
handicraft workers, living in villages, devoting their 
time to the manufacture of all manner of peasant 
wares, totals 8,000,000 to 10,000,000. Their products 
range all the way from bark sandals to jewelry, from 
cart wheels to ikons. With primitive tools and in 
primitive fashion, these ten millions produce an enor- 
mous yearly output of articles of great beauty and util- 
ity. Upon their devoted labors the Government has 
leaned heavily during the war. The workers are gen- 
erally divided into bands or artels, sharing expenses 
and profits equally, a purely communistic arrangement 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 15 

that has made great numbers of the peasants eco- 
nomically independent. 

These generations of suppression and class segrega- 
tion have also bred in the people the soul of patience, 
and if you would understand the moujik in revolt, you 
must first understand the wrath of the patient man. 
Proverbially, it is a thing to be feared. It accumulates 
through long impositions and wrongs. Then suddenly 
it bursts forth with hideous anger. 

Much has been written on the woes of the peasants, 
but as I went among them I began to feel that they 
would resent the sort of sympathy we Americans are 
apt to shower on them. Our Semitic-owned press has 
kept us sufficiently informed on all the injustice borne 
by the peasant, although it has been singularly neglect- 
ful of the peasant's standpoint and position in it all. 
We have been given the doleful picture of a human 
personification of "What's the use*?" being beaten, 
robbed and starved. Much of this picture is an ex- 
aggeration. 

Ask the peasant what he wants socially, economically 
and educationally, and he will talk much in the man- 
ner of a child about to be turned loose in a candy shop. 
Leaders of movements have gone among the people 
trying to formulate for them their woes, but when the 
moujik has been given an opportunity for expressing 
his methods for alleviating those woes, his capacity has" 
been about that of the child's before he starts to sample 
the candy. The story of the first and second Doumas 
verifies this comparison. Peasant leaders came to 
Petrograd with a program of reforms that, had it been 
adopted, no nation under the sun could have sup- 
ported. The program was tabled, and the attitude of 



16 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

the peasant was a shrug, "Niechevo!" — "What's the 
use!" He didn't care anything for the candy, after 
all. That, of course, is another expression of the pa- 
tient man's wrath; the man who nurses his woes, 
strikes a quick blow, and is all over it in the next min- 
ute. The peasant may not be entirely over it, but he 
has lost interest. In the elections for the third Douma 
the gendarmerie had fairly to drive the people to the 
polls. 

It is jften asked, "Why have not popular revolts 
succeeded?" The answer is that rarely in Russian 
history has there been anything approaching a unity 
of desire in the masses. Moreover, at no time has there 
been raised up a leader — save he came from a class 
above — who has been strong enough for the task. Such 
a leader is appearing. His name is Commerce. When 
he grows big enough the moujik will know freedom. 

However unfair it may seem and however much it 
may hurt, the hand of the bureaucracy is the only guide 
whereby the Government has kept the varied elements 
and peoples in line. That discipline has established 
and maintained a great national identity, and has 
brought into being the Russian power of assimilation 
which, as a nation, is the Russian people's greatest 
characteristic. 

Russian history is quite comparable to the psychol- 
ogy of adolescence. For the Russians are not among 
the oldest peoples in Europe as we figure civili- 
zation, but among the youngest in development and 
characteristics. Their growth has been retarded be- 
cause, for centuries, they stood as the watcher at the 
gate, repelling Asiatic hordes and suffering their cities 
to be pillaged and their fair land laid waste, while the 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 17 

rest of Europe was passing through those stages which 
brought it to its high state before the present war. 

Two things are clear in this adolescent moujik 1 s 
mind, however. They are summed up in the native 
proverb : "Our souls are God's ; our bodies, the Tsar's." 
For, despite all his experiences, the moujik bears the 
Tsar no ill-will. He may hate with destructive hatred 
the Tsar's agents, but the person and station of the 
Emperor is always to him that of the Lord's anointed. 



IV 

Of all the Tsar's regiments it is said that the 
staunchest, the bravest, the clearest-headed are those 
from Siberia. The characteristics of these Siberian 
troops, as brought out in the war, serve for an illumi- 
nating commentary on what the average moujik 
can make of himself when given a sane degree of 
liberty. 

In Siberia life is much more free than in European 
Russia, because life is much more scattered. Save in 
the cities there is not a very rigid police surveillance. 
Men and women have a chance to hew out their des- 
tinies of brain and brawn : brawn, because the life chal- 
lenges them to work; brain, because the opportunities 
for schooling are not so few and far between as one 
might be led to expect. The average rural school in 
Siberia suffers little by comparison with the rural 
schools in our thinly populated Western states. The 
city schools and private academies are well equipped 
and well attended. Tomsk University and the Tech- 
nology Institute average an agregate attendance of 
about two thousand — not a bad figure for an agricul- 



18 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

tural population scattered over an area larger than 
the United States. 

It is in Siberia that the moujik meets the ultimate 
test of his soul stuff. There he must fight not alone 
for the mere essentials of food and drink and clothes 
and shelter, but in the midst of a native Oriental 
and semi-barbaric life, must keep the faith and preserve 
the national identity. Few settlers indeed are swal- 
lowed up by the environment. The bulk of them re- 
main Orthodox and Russian. In fact, so great has 
grown the immigrant population that the native tribes 
are being fast Russified. 



Despite the valor of these progressive moujik troops 
— and a host of others — the Russian arms have suffered 
violence. The Russian soul has met defeat in this war. 
Yet it is in defeat that the Russian genius invariably 
finds victory. 

For a matter of racial and spiritual fact, reforms 
come about after an interior awakening aroused by fear 
of exterior attack and influence, and an appreciation of 
racial strength. There is the soul of France. Up to 
the present many have looked upon it as a tinsel thing, 
something to make cafes bright and vin ordinaire popu- 
lar. In the fire of defeat and discouraging delay has 
been evolved a different soul — a soul noble and strong 
and unfailing. Defeat has transfused some of the same 
elements into the Russian soul. 

Four distinct times, by the reverse of her arms, has 
the great Slav Empire rid herself of lamentable evils 
"to march on in the slow pageant of the race." The 
defeat of Peter the Great at Narva by Charles II of 



THE STRENGTH OF THE ADOLESCENT 19 

Sweden brought about the reorganization of Russian 
society. The Napoleonic invasion gave Russia a place 
in European diplomacy. The Crimean defeat was fol- 
lowed by the emancipation of the serfs and the build- 
ing up of the far-flung Asiatic provinces. The defeat 
in South Manchuria was followed by the revolution of 
1905 and the endowment of the masses with the 
semblance of a representative government. The phoe- 
nix might well replace the double eagle as the symbol 
of Russia, for the power of the Russian people lies — 
as lies the faith of the moujzk — in the Resurrection, in 
the ability to find Life after Death, and victory after 
defeat. 

The greatest victory of the Russian people thus far 
has been their defeat at Teutonic hands. It has purged 
their soul, tried it as silver is tried. What form the 
victory will take eventually, no one can foretell with 
any degree of exactness: perhaps more freedom of 
speech; perhaps more authority in self-government; 
perhaps a stable development of the great natural re- 
sources by the Russian people themselves; perhaps a 
combination of all these things. Whatever the victory, 
it will be a victory for the people. It will mean that 
the mass of the people, the moujiks, will be becoming 
more and more prepared for a step upward. And in 
that day the Russ will be even more worth understand- 
ing. 



CHAPTER II 

WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 

M,Y neighbor in the rear spoke with an irre- 
proachable Petrograd accent. He also drank 
vodka and trafficked in munitions. So, one 
day, I asked him if he weren't Russian. 

"Russian 1 ? Am I Russian?" He seemed quite sur- 
prised. "Certainly I am Russian. My grandfather 
was a Swede and my grandmother was a Tartar. . . . 
And I am Russian." 

This conversation happened in New York. I have 
had it happen a dozen times in Russia. For Napoleon 
was right — so far as he went. You do find the Tartar 
when you scratch the Russ. But Napoleon went no 
farther than Moscow. Penetrate to the outer fringes 
of the empire, and there is a great deal more to the 
Russ than the Tartar; in fact, the farther one goes 
into Russia, the more he becomes snarled in the tangled 
race roots. 

Students have striven in vain to find the pure Russ. 
There is no such person to-day. The Russ is as his 
nation, and Russia is neither the most western of East- 
ern nations nor the most eastern of Western nations. 
She is a mingling of the two. She is a gigantic mael- 
strom. 

The question of "What is a Russian 1 ?" can be an- 
swered only by tracing the various currents in this 

20 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 21 

maelstrom back to their sources. This necessitates 
' bunking" the dust off some volumes of history, but 
the process may prove illuminating and, at times, 
mildly diverting. 



Since historians have such varied and contradictory 
theories on the original sources of the Slavs — save that 
they came from Asia in the dim past of the first tribal 
migration westward — it were best to pick them up in 
the region where record first finds them — in the Car- 
pathians, in the snow-choked mountain fastnesses where 
the troops of Nicholas and Franz Josef battled for 
supremacy. 

A marauding band, these Slavs had their swarming 
nests there, and went off at intervals to take their toll 
of the countryside, penetrating at times the eastern 
limits of the Roman Empire. By the 6th Century 
they had managed to make a fairly fearsome name for 
themselves. But this was not to continue. In the 
course of time, internecine strife and attacks by other 
tribesmen — the Avars mostly — robbed them of their 
power. They were split into two groups : the Western 
Slavs, which comprised the progenitors of the Mora- 
vians, Czechs, Poles and Pomeranians ; and the Eastern 
Slavs, which included the forefathers of the Croats, 
Serbs and Ruthenians. The former drifted north, but 
the latter migrated, under attack and under the lure 
of a more kindly climate, to the valley of the Dnieper 
River, where they fell into trading in the products of 
the forest — wax, honey and furs. 1 

*This is the most plausible of three theories concerning the origin 
of the progenitors of the Russian Slavs. Early Russian chroniclers 
hold quite the opposite view. The German historian, A. V. von 



22 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

The land between the Dnieper and the Don was a 
thick forest. In this they made clearings and built up 
their goroditscha or fortified house-yards. Clusters of 
these goroditscha formed the nucleus of gorods, towns. 
This word gorod is still preserved in the names of many 
Russian towns and cities. Thus, Novgorod, the new 
city; Petrograd, the city of Peter; Tsargrad, as Con- 
stantinople was known in the old days and still is 
known to those who dream of supplanting the Crescent 
over St. Sophia by the Cross. 

This Dnieper Valley, together with the valleys of the 
Lovat and the Volkshov and Lakes Ladoga and Illmen, 
formed a natural avenue of commerce between the Bal- 
tic and the Black Sea, between the Scandinavian Penin- 
sula and Byzantium. By the time the Eastern Slavs 
began to make their way down into this great plain 
the path was already well denned by caravans passing 
southward to Byzantium. The newcomers naturally 
took up the trade and became powers in the land. Their 
proclivity for conquest was only in abeyance, however, 
for as they grew in power they reverted to their for- 
mer marauding. Roving bands ravaged the country 
round about and penetrated eastward. These expedi- 
tions netted, among other booty, large bodies of cap- 
tives which were taken in turn to Byzantium and sold 
as slaves. Here is the alleged source of our word slave ; 
not that the Slavs were slaves but that they dealt in 

Scholzer, and the Russians, Karamsin, Pogodin and Soloviev, con- 
tend that primitive tribes of Finns and Slavs lived in the Great 
Russian Plain prior to the 9th Century, and that Scandinavians com- 
ing from the north taught them their first conception of tribal govern- 
ment. 

A third theory is that the Eastern Slavs dwelt in the Russian Plain 
long before the Christian Era, that they had primitive family unions 
from which were formed tribes that later developed tribal unions, 
eventually gravitating into the trading cities of Kiev and Novgorod. 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 23 

them; in fact, by the end of the 1 ith Century the Slavs 
were the masters of the fur and slave trade. 

The government of the people at this time was 
purely tribal. Each tribe — and their name was legion 
— had an overlord who bore the title of Tsar. The 
title has ever since clung to the supreme head of Rus- 
sia. It was not held officially until the reign of Ivan 
III, and between his time and the time of Peter the 
Great (1721) Tsar was the recognized title. Peter 
the Great, expanding his empire, assumed the title of 
Emperor. The monarch now bears the triple title, 
Emperor of Russia, Tsar of Poland and Grand Duke 
of Finland. This original tribal government was 
patriarchal to all intents and purposes, and the relation 
between the masses and the family overlord was close. 
A remnant of this feeling is to be found among the 
masses to-day. They refer to the Emperor as the 
Tsar, and often as "Little Father." The latter title, 
however, does not necessarily imply any ardent 
affection, as, in this generation, it is an every-day 
diminutive. 

The increase of the Byzantine traffic and the amal- 
gamation of the goroditscha into towns and the growth 
of the towns into the great trading cities marked the 
first period of these Slavs and of Russian history. The 
history centers about Kiev, the chief of the trading 
cities in the south and about Novgorod, the chief city 
in the north — marking the Slav terminals of the cara- 
van traffic — and about the smaller cities en route, 
Pskov, Smolensk and Polotsk. The people who came 
there, mingled and inter-married with the Eastern 
Slavs, or even attacked them, were the first currents to 
start swirling in the maelstrom of the Russian soul. 



24 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Two main currents introduced at this epoch were 
the Chozars and the Variagians. Their stories also 
serve as excellent examples of racial characteristics still 
discernible in the national genus. 

About the same time that the Eastern Slavs began 
to spread over the Great Russian Plain, the steppes of 
the south were invaded by an Asiatic horde, of Turk- 
ish and Arabic origin, known as the Chozars. Although 
a nomadic race they built cities in this steppe region 
that grew so prosperous as to lure thither great num- 
bers of Arabic and Jewish traders. The Jewish ele- 
ment predominated; in fact, its influence increased so 
rapidly that the Chozars found it to their advantage to 
adopt Judaism. In the course of the 8th Century this 
great Jewish body formed an empire that controlled 
much of the Baltic-Black Sea trade. The Slavic tribes 
living near the steppes were duly subjugated and com- 
pelled to pay tribute. But the Slavs turned their sub- 
jugation to good account, for, as conquered people, their 
trade was protected and they had to concern themselves 
only with the trafficking. From the Chozars they 
learned the art of commerce and its possibilities. With 
almost modern astuteness they developed their business 
on the capital of a competitor ! By the middle of the 
9th Century they had learned the art so well as to out- 
strip their subjugators and command control of the 
trading situation. 

With the Chozars eliminated from the situation as 
rival traders, and the Byzantium traffic taking such 
proportions that almost every Slav was in some way 
concerned with it, there were not enough people avail- 
able to guard the lonely hinterland stretches of the 
trade routes and to convoy the caravans. For this pur- 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 25 

pose were then called in a number of non-Slavic tribes 
— Swedes, Norwegians, Goths and Angles — known col- 
lectively as the Variagians. Mercenaries these, men 
with a price. Given the task of policing the routes, 
they soon grew sufficiently powerful to demand their 
own terms. From wage earners they became leviers of 
tribute, usurpers of power. They drew recruits from 
the north, trebled their numbers, dictated their own 
terms and succeeded in establishing their own leaders 
as princes of the trading cities. It was almost an ex- 
act counterpart of what the Normans did in Italy in 
the llth Century. The free trading cities, Kiev and 
Novgorod, became Variagian princedoms. Rurik, 
whom the Russians reckon their first ruler, was, in cold 
fact, nothing more than a mercenary leader raised to 
power by the influence of his mercenary fellows. Even- 
tually these foreign leaders evolved the Boyarstvo, an 
aristocracy of landowners who played an important 
role in Russian history until the middle of the 13th 
Century. 

Thus came two currents — Jewish, Arabic and Turk- 
ish in the beginning, Swedish, Norwegian, Gothic and 
Angle later — setting the maelstrom on the spin. The 
latter introduction of foreign blood also marked the 
beginning of a practice that has ever since been one 
of the deterrents to Russian progress as an individual 
nation. 

Throughout her history Russia has constantly called 
in alien people to help in her work, to lend her a hand. 
Almost invariably has the hired assistant overcome his 
employer. Because of its proximity, Germany has been 
chief contributor of this assistance, and not until the 
war was well under way did the mass of the Russian 



26 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

people recognize that what the Variagians had done 
in the loth Century, Germany was attempting to do 
in the 20th; moreover, that she had well-nigh accom- 
plished her purpose. 

The later development of the Variagian invasion 
marked the beginning of still another Russian national 
characteristic discernible to-day — the power of assimi- 
lating foreign peoples. The Variagian elements even- 
tually became wholly absorbed in the Slavic, just as 
previously had the Chozars been drawn into the na- 
tional mid-stream. 

The introduction of foreign elements by no means 
weaned the developing Russ nation away from the 
West. Between the Near East of those days and the 
other European powers was the binding cordiality of 
mutually advantageous commerce, exchange of art and 
literature and the kinship of blood. The Princes of 
Kiev were related to the rulers of France, Hungary, 
Norway and England. Kiev was rivaling the glory 
of Byzantium. Then came a cleavage. The wedge 
was forged in the fires of dogma. Russia suddenly ac- 
cepted Christianity. 

Previous to the end of the 10th Century the religion 
of the Eastern Slavs was a mixture of nature and an- 
cestor worship, based on a well-defined mythology. In 
988 Vladimir, Prince of Kiev, was converted to Chris- 
tianity through his marriage with Anne, sister of the 
Emperor of Greece, and by royal decree the people 
under him were baptized and allied themselves with 
the Christian religion as interpreted by the Byzantine 
Church. Kiev, already commercial and intellectual 
center of Russ, became the spiritual metropolis. 

This national acceptance of Christianity had a far- 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 27 

reaching effect on both the people and the relations be- 
tween the embryo Russian nation and the rest of Eu- 
rope. 

As is observed in the preceding chapter, the pagan 
strain is still a vital element in the peasant's faith, the 
peasant's life close to the soil being unquestionably 
responsible for it, although some of the legends and 
practices still extant are traceable to those in the 
mythology of the ancient Russ and of the native tribes 
that were assimilated. By this I do not mean to infer 
that the peasant's paganism is merely an inheritance 
from these early times; yet fidelity to primitive type 
is a characteristic strong with the Russian even to-day. 

With Christianity came the Church, Vladimir mak- 
ing the spiritual government of Russ conform to the 
lines of that in Byzantium. "The State entrusted to 
her jurisdiction all matters and relations of life which 
sprang directly from the popular adoption of Chris- 
tianity ; while, on the other side, the clergy were guided 
in the regulations of those matters and relations by the 
Church's rules, reenforced by authority granted them 
by the temporal power for the taking of such dis- 
ciplinary and administrative measures as might seem 
advisable for the adapting of those rules to the exist- 
ing conditions of Russian Life." 1 Immediately there 
began to develop important distinctions and definitions 
that seriously affected the life of the people. 

Whereas before the masses were guided by instinct 
and inclination, their life was now circumscribed by 
laws and regulations. Distinction was made between 
crime and sin, between the infringement of the law 
of man and the law of God. There came into being 

1 A History of Russia. By V. O. Kluchevsky. Vol. I. Page 172. 



28 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

the Ordinance, the Church law, and the Russkaia 
Pravada, the law of the State. For each type of in- 
fringement special penalties were set — corporal pun- 
ishment and fines being the usual modes. Neither of 
these codes recognized the validity of the death pen- 
alty; for that matter, save in the case of political crimes 
and "military necessity," Russian law still makes no 
provision for the extreme penalty. Laws preserving 
the sanctity of women were very strict in the Pravada 
and the Church was equally strict in narrowing the 
circle of consanguinity. Another outcome of this ec- 
clesiastical influence was that for the pagan union of 
the clan the Christian union of the family was sub- 
stituted. 

But even more far-reaching were the effects on the 
Russian nation. The bond between peoples at this 
time was the bond of faith. Automatically, as she took 
on Byzantine Christianity, did Kiev cut herself off 
from Roman Christianity and the interests the Church 
of the West controlled. The schism was more than 
a break in dogma, it was a break in standards. By her 
choice Kiev lost caste. She was no longer ranked on 
a par with the nations of the West, and to that rating 
is due much of the subconscious prejudice against Rus- 
sia to-day. 

II 

By the 12th Century slavery had assumed vast pro- 
portions. Kiev, the artistic, industrial, intellectual, ad- 
ministrative and ecclesiastical center of Russ, owed its 
richness of life to the labors of thousands of slaves. 
The wealth of the country thereabouts was dependent 
on slave labor. Through this system eventually grew 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 29 

up the great disparity between classes, between the 
rich merchant and the slave laborer, between the 
wealthy landowner and the slave farmer. Among the 
ruling classes jealousy of power and wealth sowed seeds 
of dissension. In the economic and social structure of 
Kiev appeared those cracks which presage collapse. The 
dissension within was equaled only by the threat of 
attack from without. On the horizon loomed the 
shadow of the Mongol. Twice already had the Eastern 
Slavs stemmed Asiatic invasions — the Petchenges in 
the 9th and 11th Centuries and the Polovetzes in the 
11th and 13th; twice already had attacking and con- 
spiring people — the Chozars and the Variagians — been 
absorbed. But now there was no such defensive unity 
in the Slav people. 

Dissatisfaction, coupled with the fact that the trade 
in forest products required an occasional change of 
scene, bred among the people the desire to migrate. 
The 12th Century had seen a steady stream of settlers 
going northward. By degrees Kiev was depopulated. 
Dissenting princes moved up the Oka and Volga val- 
leys and founded rival kingdoms. The city of Vladi- 
mir sprang up, and Moscow later assumed the heritage 
of Kiev. The Russian people split into small groups 
and the land was divided into small provinces, each 
rivaling the other with a jealousy that was anything 
but Christian, in fact, at times heathenishly murderous. 
In short, there was no bond of ideals or purposes be- 
tween the factions of the Russ people. 

Then came the debacle. From the East swept the 
Mongol hordes. Once they were thrown back, but they 
returned again. Kiev fell and was reduced to shambles. 
The tide poured on. By 1240 Russia was completely 



30 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

beneath the yoke of the Mongol. Mongol and Tartar 
chieftains laid their destructive hands upon the po- 
litical, economic and social life of the people, and for 
200 years Russia suffered the invader. 

By her subjugation Russia placed the rest of Europe 
eternally in her debt, for she stemmed the westward 
tide of invasion. Europe was left to work out her 
economic and political destinies unmolested. Russia 
had to bide her time. 

Russia has always bided her time. Her national ca- 
pacity for patience is superhuman. But with this pa- 
tient harmlessness of the dove there has always been 
the regenerating wisdom of the serpent. What the 
Eastern Slavs accomplished by their defeat and sub- 
jugation to the Chozars and Variagians in the 9th Cen- 
tury, the Russian accomplished with the Tartars in the 
13th. 

By ingratiating themselves with the Tartar Khans 
of Kazan, Astrakhan and the Crimea, as the Golden 
Horde was divided, the princes of Russia succeeded in 
getting a hand once more in the administration of 
affairs. Those who were fortunate enough to gain this 
favor were the princes of Moscow, and through the 
growth of their power Moscow became the state about 
which the Russian Empire was built. Once this power 
was gained, the Golden Horde read its doom. Ivan 
III delivered the death blow. Moscovy rose from the 
ashes. The Tartar was driven out, but great numbers 
stayed and were assimilated. Also during the two pre- 
ceding centuries there had been infused into the Slav 
blood a perceptible Tartar strain. 

And there we are, back once more to the Russian 
munition agent who said that his grandmother was a 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 31 

Tartar and his grandfather was a Swede, and he was 
Russian. 

in 

v There are three main ethnological groups in Russia 
today — the Great, Little and White Russians. Each 
has a separate history, each has its body of legends and 
its own peculiar mode of living; one, at least, has its 
own political aspirations. These differences, to which 
the traveler to Russia must be accustomed, can be 
traced in large measure to the effects of climate and 
environment and the assimilation of native tribes. 

The migration of the Kiev malcontents and traders 
northward and the Mongol raids left the Dnieper Val- 
ley depopulated, a state in which it remained until the 
middle of the 15th Century. It also left it open to 
invasion and annexation by peoples from the West. 
The latter was accomplished by a combination of Poles 
and Lithuanians. 

When the Tartar tide began to recede, life in the 
Dnieper Valley assumed once more its pleasing pros- 
pect. From Poland and Galicia came immigrants. 
Kiev was rebuilt, although it never regained its former 
glory. In time this region, the Dnieper, Dniester and 
Bug valleys, began to be alluded to as Malaia Roosia, 
Little Russia, otherwise the Ukraine or border. As a 
separate province it existed until its peoples and terri- 
tories were conquered by Ivan the Terrible and consoli- 
dated into the Greater Moscovy. 

Little Russia now comprises the three governments 
of Tchennigoff, Poltava and Kharkoff. It is a region 
generously endowed by Nature, where "everything 
breathes of plenty, where the rivers flow brighter than 



32 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

silver, where the gentle steppe winds rustle the grasses 
and the farm buildings are lost in the cherry groves." 
The population totals over 26.6% of the whole em- 
pire, and the density is greater there than in any other 
part. In the blood of the people are Turkish and Iran- 
ian strains, some Lithuanian and some Pole. 

The Little Russian is brown-haired, tall and well 
built. His dialect, distinct from that of Great Russia, 
contains many Polish words, and is the nearest ap- 
proach to-day to the original Slav tongue. While a 
faithful citizen of the Empire and a faithful Ortho- 
dox believer in the main, the Little Russian is inde- 
pendent and might, had he energy enough, be interested 
in the propaganda Austria has long been engineering 
for the revolt of the Ukraine against the Empire. 

The discontent of the Ukraine is derived from lin- 
guistic rather than political causes. The Russian Gov- 
ernment has forbidden the teaching of the Ukrainian 
tongue in the public schools — just as Germany has for- 
bidden the teaching of Polish in her Polish provinces — 
and as the Little Russians possess this ancient and dis- 
tinct dialect and a body of literature of their own, 
there is just reason for their wishing to preserve it. 
Its suppression is a very short-sighted measure on the 
part of the Government. Naturally the enemies of 
Russia have taken advantage of this administrative 
measure. During the present war the Ukrainian pris- 
oners have been kept segregated from the other Rus- 
sian prisoners in camps in Baden, treated with more 
consideration than the others, and made to feel that 
they had bitter grievance against their Government. 
Austria, in her efforts to alienate the fidelity of the 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 33 

Ukrainians is only pursuing her usual policy of "Di- 
vide and Rule." 

The other tide of emigrants that started from the 
Dnieper Valley settled in the northeast. A new Nov- 
gorod came into existence. Under the Grand Dukes 
of Moscovy, Moscow grew from a little outpost fort 
of the province of Vladimir to a full-fledged town, in 
fact into the administrative and ecclesiastical center 
of Russia, for the Grand Dukes of Moscovy conquered 
the territory that touched on it. 

In going northward the people met and fused with 
Finnish and Tartar natives, docile, peaceable people, 
of the Volga and Oka Valleys, in regions that now con- 
stitute the center of Great Russia. Finnish and Tar- 
tar manners and customs were adopted by the new- 
comers, the native racial type, language, morals and 
beliefs going into the composite of the Russian na- 
tionality. Thus grew up the Moscovites of Great Rus- 
sians (Vielkoruss), who now comprise 70% of the total 
population of European Russia. 

The Great Russians are tall, well-built folk, with 
brown hair and blue eyes, flat faces and very white 
teeth. They are. a vivacious people, alert, shrewd, fear- 
less — characteristics bred in them through long, hard 
battles for livelihood in the forests and swamps. From 
their ranks came the settlers who first braved the Si- 
berian wilderness and planted the flag of empire firmly 
in the Asiatic provinces. 

The third ethnological group — 7% of the whole — 
are the White Russians (Bieloruss), who occupy the 
upper Dnieper, a land singularly barren of charm or 



34 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

natural resources. The people have an admixture of 
Lithuanian and West Finnish blood in their veins. 
Of all the Russians, they are the poorest class, given 
to drunkenness, laziness and an appalling aptitude for 
petty dishonesty. The soil of White Russia is very 
poor and the consequent crops negligible, save where 
the land is owned and worked by Poles. Such factories 
as are in this region were owned and operated — until 
the war began — by Germans. An illiterate body, boast- 
ing no literature to speak of, the White Russians repre- 
sent the very sort of people many foreigners conceive 
all Russians to be. 

IV 

Another and more important body — a warrior race 
quite separate from the men in the street — are the Cos- 
sacks. The word kazak originally meant freebooter, 
and in that word is the story of the origin of the class, 
a story of great romance. 

In the beginning the Cossacks were inhabitants of 
Little Russia — the Ukraine — but their nomadic life 
had made them a mixed race, a people in whose veins 
ran Tartar, Turkish, Caucasian, Slavonic and Gothic 
blood. The Ukraine, which was the border land, had 
no limits and confines and the people were obliged to 
defend their homes against attack from all sides. 
Watchful waiting for a possible fight soon became 
a racial habit. Back and forth across the Ukraine 
swept the tides of conquest — Turks, Poles and Tartars. 
Like our New England forebears, the peasant, as a 
16th Century contemporary put it, "went to work with 
a gun on his shoulder and a sword at his side." Despite 
this precarious existence in the midst of warring peo- 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 35 

pies, enough of the population survived to form the 
nucleus of the Cossacks. 

They were Orthodox folk, trained in the art of war. 
For the furtherance of the faith and the exercise of 
the latter art, they formed themselves into a great 
brotherhood, the Zaporogian Setcha. This knighthood 
was not unlike King Arthur's. Its purposes were to 
go about righting wrongs, defending the poor and weak, 
overcoming the heathen and driving them from the 
earth. All men were free and equal in the brotherhood. 
At the head stood the Ataman, or chief, who was elected 
by the members; the government of the clan was in 
the hands of a Circle or assembly of the people. Thus 
from the start the Cossack Government was a republic, 
and as a republic it administered the affairs of the 
Ukraine for several generations. 

It was a wild, free life they led in the borderland. 
(You can read of it in Sienkiewicz's With Fire and 
Sword.) Now they would battle against the heathen 
foe, now they would settle down and marry the heathen 
foe's daughters. Once a year the men of the brother- 
hood forsook their wives and retired into a military 
"retreat" — to use the religious application of the word 
— in their rendezvous among the islands of the 
Dnieper. What went on there history does not record ; 
possibly maneuvers, undoubtedly a great deal of 
drinking and bragging. 1 

Under this romantic regime the Cossacks built up 
their own legends and colorful history. They swash- 

1 1 use the word "bragging" advisedly. Quite apart from the fact 
that this is the custom of the sterner -sex, it is the term used in the old 
bylinas, or folk epics, to describe the manner of speech of the heroes. 
Thus in the legend of "Quiet Dunai Ivanovitch" we find the phrase, 
"When all were well drunken, and the feast waxed merry, they 
began to brag." 



36 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

buckled around the countryside, attacking anything 
not Orthodox — Catholic Pole, Tartar Moslem and 
Jew — making love when it pleased them, drinking 
copiously save in time of war (when to drink meant 
death by hanging) , and altogether having a remarkably 
ideal time. 

In the beginning they invariably fought on the side 
of the underdog, fought fearlessly and fiercely, and 
their name soon enough became synonymous with 
bravery and cruelty. This idealistic warfare was 
destined to pass away, however, for the Cossacks even- 
tually degenerated into mere mercenaries, fighting on 
the side that offered the highest price. 

During the latter part of the 16th and early years 
of the 17th Centuries, they fought successively against 
the Poles; with the Poles against Russia and Tur- 
key; against Turkey; and then against Poland. They 
experienced a constant succession of peace and war 
with the Kingdom of Poland, of affiliation with it 
and rebellion against it. Finally, when the Ukraine 
became part of Moscovy in 1667, the Cossacks were 
enrolled in the Russian ranks. 

The change of allegiance made them by no means 
loyal and faithful subjects. Numbering over 300,000 
horsemen, fully equipped and hardened by warfare, 
they caused such internal trouble that the Moscovite 
Princes found just reason for suppressing them. 
Gradually their ranks were thinned and their leaders 
hanged. By the time of Ivan the Terrible they were 
subdued to such a degree of pliability that they could 
be trusted to serve the State to further its purposes. 

Among the designs of the State at this time was ex- 
pansion eastward and the conquest of the Siberian 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 37 

tribes. Under Yermak, a fearless leader, the Cossacks 
crossed the Urals, defeated the Tartars at a spot near 
where now stands the city of Omsk, and battled their 
way through the wilderness and hostile tribes across 
Asia. By 1775 their stanitsas (fortified villages) were 
dotted along a line that formed the Great Road to the 
Pacific, and their standards had been carried across 
the Behring Straits and planted over Alaska. Ever 
since that time the Cossacks have been on the forefront 
of the Empire, protecting it against invasion from 
without and uprising within. 

The Cossacks now number about 2,500,000, of which 
185,000 are active soldiers. They are divided into 
ten Voiskos, or districts, which give them their distinct 
classification: Don Cossacks, Kuban, Astrakhan, 
Terek, Orenburg, Ural, Siberian, Semiryschensk, Amur 
and Usurri. In return for services rendered the Gov- 
ernment they are granted special privileges. Their land 
is given them free of cost and they hold it free of 
taxation. They also possess hunting and fishing rights 
and the privilege of brewing beer. In addition they 
retain their peculiar social and political organization: 
each stanitsas (village division of the Voiskos) has its 
Stanitsas Ataman; public matters are decided, as in 
the beginning, by popular vote. The Tsarevitch was 
the chief Ataman of all the Cossacks. 

The services the Cossacks render the State are a con- 
stant preparedness for war and for mobilization. Each 
trooper supplies his own horse and equipment, and he 
must be ready at a moment's notice to saddle up and 
ride off wherever the Tsar may command. 

At the age of 18 a youth enters the army and for 
three years thereafter is in the "rookie" class. At 21 



38 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

he joins a field regiment in which he serves four years. 
A second four years are spent in a regiment of the sec- 
ond class, and then he goes to a regiment of the third 
order. After this, he enters the reserve, serves there 
five years, and finally completes his career by being 
enrolled in the Opolchina, which is Russia's equivalent 
for the German Landsturm. 

Although in the beginning lovers of liberty, avowed 
foes of the rich and protectors of the poor, the Cossacks 
have long since ceased to serve such idealistic ends. 
Soldiers, whose business it is to obey, they have been 
employed in putting down riots and pogroms — on 
every occasion where political and social unrest has 
to require their services. And in this capacity they 
have well earned their name for cruelty. Since they 
have no close political affiliation with the average folk, 
they have no sympathies and can be trusted to strike 
right and left once the order is given — an order that 
the soldier of the locality would be loath to obey. In 
times of peace they ride the far-flung Asiatic frontier, 
and by their presence protect and encourage the thou- 
sands of settlers who go there every year to take up 
life in Russia's Land of Promise. 

While the majority of the Cossacks are Orthodox, 
a goodly number are Raskolniks, or Old Believers, who 
did not take to the new order of things ecclesiastical in 
the time of Peter the Great and the reformer Nikon. 

For some time there has been agitated a restriction 
of Cossack privileges, but they have given such a good 
account of themselves in the present war that it is quite 
unlikely they will suffer any economic or political re- 
strictions for some time to come. 




WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 39 



v 



From the hour when Moscovy rose revived from the 
ashes of the Tartar fire, until the present generation, 
there has been an almost steady acquisition of peoples 
and lands by the Empire. 

Siberia, wrested from the tribes, was Russian by the 
16th Century, and several years before our own settlers 
had pierced the wilderness west of the Mississippi Rus- 
sia was firmly settled in the extreme northwest of 
America. Thus was gathered into the folds of empire 
an expanse of territory twice the size of the Continent, 
peopled with a great diversity of nomadic tribes, speak- 
ing a variety of dialects' and believing half a dozen 
faiths — Moslem, semi-Moslem, Buddhism, Shaman- 
ism and pure pagan. Since the building of the Trans- 
Siberian and the sweep of settlers into the Asiatic prov- 
inces, many of these tribes have dropped their nomadic 
life and clustered into villages. The presence of the 
Cossack stanitsas has helped develop their nominal citi- 
zenship into actual and active allegiance. Some of the 
bravest fighting in this war lies to the credit of these 
native tribesmen. In religion they are still Moslem, 
semi-Moslem, Buddhistic or pagan, despite the fact 
that until the Edict of Toleration (promulgated in 
1905), they were classed collectively as Orthodox. To 
them is extended a toleration not characteristic of the 
European provinces of the Empire. 

Since 1808, when Finland was acquired by Russia, 
the Scandinavian element has steadily been entering 
the Empire and the Protestant influence steadily in- 
creasing. The conquest of the Caucasus brought in 
the Georgians and Armenians — Mohammedans and 



40 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

early Christians * by religion. The partition of Poland 
at the end of the 18th Century introduced a Roman 
Catholic element which before this time was not an 
important factor. Thus were the racial and national 
families assembled. 

To recapitulate : The main divisions of the Russian 
people are the Great, Little and White Russians; the 
Siberian tribes that are now outnumbered eight to one 
by the settlers; the Georgians and Armenians; the 
Letts and Poles, the Lithuanians, Finns and Germans 
of the Baltic Provinces. 

These groups represent Orthodox churchmen 
(69.9%), Roman Catholics (9.8%), Mohammedans 
(10.8%), Lutherans, semi-Mohammedans, Jews (4%) 
and pagans, beside a host of sects. They comprise 
sixty-four racial and tribal divisions, people both ab- 
sorbed and unabsorbed, loyal and disloyal, speaking 
no less than 150 tongues and dialects and living in 
a variety of climates and environments from the Arctic 
to well-nigh the Equator, from the Pacific to the Baltic. 

The political affinities of these people are as varied 
as their faiths and tongues. Within the past century 
the Great and Little Russians have experienced an 
active infiltration of Germans and Austrians, many of 
whom made no effort to adopt either the Russian tongue 
or Russian life. The Little Russians are constantly 
being urged on by Austrian and German agents to 
strike out for the freedom of the Ukraine. The in- 

1 While the world justly sympathizes with the sufferings of the 
Armenian people, it should not shut its eyes to the fact that no race 
under the sun is capable of more treachery, dishonesty and down- 
right abominations than the Armenians. Russia has eminent justifica- 
tion for heavily policing their region, and Turkey finds the same 
measures necessary.. In nine cases out of ten the Armenians have 
received according to their just merits. 



WHAT IS A RUSSIAN? 41 

habitants of the Baltic provinces — most of them lost 
now to Russia — were more German than Russ. As 
for the Pole — he loves Russia about as much as an 
Irishman loves England. In the Caucasus there has 
been one attempt to found a republic and the pro- 
Turkish element is always restive under Russian rule. 
In Siberia alone does there seem to be any unadul- 
terated allegiance — mainly because the people there 
are too busy to bother their heads about fantastic po- 
litical programs. 

With such a motley and hyphenated population 
Russia can take no chances on sudden national awak- 
enings, such as are in store for the United States un- 
less, of course, we find means to amalgamate into last- 
ing fealty the political and racial sympathies of those 
hosts of foreigners who are drawn to our shores by 
the money lure. Russia is not losing sight of her ulti- 
mate destiny in a welter of honeyed words and pleas- 
ing sentiments. Besides, as she has already learned by 
this war, the path of her progress lies not in a whole- 
sale adoption of Western methods and ideals, but in 
a gradual growing up to them. To use the simile of 
Prof. VinogradofT in his Self -Government in Russia, 
she is slowly, turning around, swinging from East to 
West. ir' 

But she must turn on her own foundations and by 
the power of her own will and the energy of her own 
strength. 



CHAPTER III 

A DEMOCRACY IN THE ^MAKING 

RUSSIA to-day is a democracy in the making; 
or, to express it in terms of its past, it is gradu- 
ally reverting to a democracy. 
Contrary to the course of other European powers, 
Russia began as a democracy, evolved into an au- 
tocracy under the influence of the Mongol Khans and, 
later, under the necessity for forcing home Western 
ideals and for centralizing the government in the reigns 
of Peter the Great and Catherine the Great respec- 
tively. Ever since it has been struggling to attain its 
former state. Each of these political developments, it 
is well to remember, was made for the solidarity of the 
nation, and was begun with the ostensible purpose of 
public welfare, and, in many instances, by popular 
elective consent. 



The peak of the autocracy is the Emperor. Because 
he is supposed to voice the will of the people (tem- 
pered by the will of God as he may interpret it!) he 
is given absolute authority. Hence the stroke of his 
pen came to be the most powerful agency in Rus- 
sia. He wielded it irrespective of his people's wishes 
and contrary to the counsel of his ministers. Yet such 
authority has its advantages. With the stroke of the 

42 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 43 

pen were the serfs — 43,000,000 of them — freed in 
1861; whereas, in this country, the liberation of the 
slaves — only 3,500,000 in all — required four long 
years of bloody, internecine strife that rent the country 
in twain. With the stroke of the pen was the sale of 
vodka prohibited throughout the empire in 1914, and 
the largest single item of revenue enjoyed by the Gov- 
ernment was automatically lopped off, a feat that, here 
in America — notwithstanding the fact that the liquor 
trade is not a Government monopoly — would be almost 
inconceivable. 

Absolutism in Russia has grown in ratio to govern- 
ment monopoly. This monopoly has been assumed 
from time to time for the purpose of increasing the 
revenue on the one hand, and serving the public needs 
on the other. Such almost universal paternalism makes 
absolute authority possible. The people would seem 
to be caught between two fires. Not the fact that the 
Emperor always exercised this authority, but his abil- 
ity to exercise it, was at once the strength and weak- 
ness of the Government. 

Absolute authority was held to be necessary for keep- 
ing in line the motley of peoples and religions and 
political factors that comprise the Empire. In addi- 
tion, it was a corrective to the wilfulness of the few 
and a safeguard to the many, who are illiterate, igno- 
rant and economically dependent. It is this very disci- 
pline that has given the Russian people a unified pur- 
pose in times of great national crisis, such as the present 
European War. Summarized in its best terms, it is 
designed to work for the greatest good of the greatest 
number. Reduced to its worst terms, such authority 
and discipline fall heavily on those who are past the 



44 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

need for it ; of the latter group the numbers are increas- 
ing rapidly. There, in a nutshell, is the situation of 
the people versus the bureaucracy to-day. 



ii 

The story of the rise and decline of absolutism is 
not without its romance. 

In the time of the Eastern Slavs and until the Mon- 
gol invasion in the 13th Century, the tribal govern- 
ment was democratic and representative, the citizens 
being free and equal under the law. The Mir, which 
exists to this day, was a government by the heads of 
the families. Embryo representation was also found 
in the government of the great trading cities, Nov- 
gorod and Pskov and the republics contiguous to them, 
which in the 1 2th Century had their Vietches or assem- 
blies of citizens. 

The conception of absolute authority was of Eastern 
source, a system learned from the Mongols, who, after 
the subjugation of the country, retired to their Eastern 
provinces and left the administration of affairs in the 
hands of local representatives. This authority was 
gradually acquired by the Grand Dukes of Moscovy 
as they gathered strength in their capacity of local 
deputies of the Golden Horde. The Grand Dukes 
fought organization with organization, absolutism with 
absolutism. They thereby unified the scattered masses 
and gave them individual and collective strength to 
overcome the invader. 

In the reign of Ivan III the authority was endowed 
with a sacred aspect. Ivan married Sophia, a Palseolo- 
gus, niece of the last Emperor of Greece, and the Rus- 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 45 

sian dynasty became related to the Byzantine, which 
was likewise the source and form of the Church. From 
its sacred plane it grew to despotism under the same 
Tsar, despotism that bore fruit in the conquest and 
consolidation of principalities fringing on Moscovy, 
but at the same time instilled into the masses that 
slavish fear of the Emperor's person and will which 
still exists to-day. It was Ivan III who took for his 
insignia the double-headed eagle of Byzantium, the 
crest ever since borne by Russia. 

Even after this assumption of absolute authority the 
voice and vote of the people were still the power in 
the land. Despite his unspeakable methods, Ivan IV 
(The Terrible) was the active friend and protector 
of his people. When he came to the throne there ex- 
isted in Moscovy the Zemsky Sobor, a consultative coun- 
cil formed of representatives of the various states, con- 
vened in times of great national crisis; and the Boyar- 
skaia Douma, a permanent council of aristocratic land- 
owners which directed the administration of affairs. 
Even this boyar authority was distasteful to the peo- 
ple, and, taking sides with the masses, Ivan set about 
to suppress the boyar and to better his people's lot. 

Boris Goudonov, his successor but one, owed his 
accession to popular vote, yet he espoused the cause 
of the Dvorianies, or lesser nobles, that he might gain 
their support against the boyar landed aristocracy. 

The great economic problem at this time was where 
to get labor. There was land enough, but not suffi- 
cient people to farm it, and those on the land never 
stayed permanently settled in one place. (From the 
beginning the Russ has always been possessed with a 
perfect mania for migrating about ! ) The boyars could 



46 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

afford to pay their farmers sufficient wages to bribe 
them into "staying put"; the lesser nobles were not 
so fortunately situated. To satisfy the latter's re- 
quirements, Boris issued a ukase on St. George's Day, 
1597 (St. George's Day is the Russian annual moving 
day — their first of May), forbidding all free laborers 
to leave the estates and farms on which they were 
working. Thus, by the stroke of the pen, did serfdom 
come into existence, to continue a gigantic political and 
economic problem for 300 years until, again by the 
stroke of the pen, it was abolished and 43,000,000 serfs 
became freed men. 

Keenly alive to what this blow at Russian independ- 
ence meant, the gentry and upper middle class took up 
arms against the aristocracy. Troublous times fell on 
the throne. One usurper after another arose, was over- 
come and disappeared. 

Through all this the will of the people was gathering 
its forces. The fire of a great political and religious 
reform swept through Russia in the 16th Century. It 
quickened the lowly and the high, the lordly and the 
peasant. A solidarity gripped all classes. Russia must 
be saved ! And once more national salvation was found 
in the inalienable right of the people; they restored 
the power of the ballot. By popular election was 
Mikail Romanov, scion of a family that had lively 
sympathies with the people, raised to the throne. Thus 
through the will of the people the present dynasty came 
into being. 

The next Romanov to leave his mark upon Russia 
and the world was Peter the Great. He inherited the 
popular interest of his clan together with a Titanic am- 
bition to chart the shortest and most efficient course to 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 47 

their betterment. With his own hands he labored 
abroad, and then came back to teach his fellow coun- 
trymen what he had learned. He destroyed the power 
of the boyar, reformed the political and social order — 
basing it on Western types — and made the Church an 
arm of the State. He founded a new capital in the 
north and gave Russia her first navy. He created the 
Governing Senate, which was a representative body of 
the people, and granted the municipalities and prov- 
inces a form of self-government. The system of per- 
sonal nobility also came into existence whereby a 
man's rank may depend on his individual services to 
the State and not on the doubtful services of an an- 
cestor. In short, Peter the Great was at once the first 
democrat of Russia and its first real absolute ruler. 

"There never was a reform that was not opposed 
by a Lion and an Ass." True to the proverb, this in- 
fusion of Western efficiency failed to meet with the 
approval of a large section of the people. The ecclesi- 
astical reforms of Nikon had split the Church into the 
Old Believers, those who held to the old order, and 
the New. In addition Peter called in foreigners to 
help him formulate and teach his new systems, and 
the troubles of the people took on a new character. 

Previous to this time the problems of the people 
were mainly such as arose among themselves ; they now 
began to include the factor of foreign relations and 
foreign influence within the borders of Russia. Peter 
opened a window to Europe, which was well; but 
through that window have flown into Russia influences 
that have worked as much for her woe as for her weal. 
It has been the story of the Variagians all over again; 



48 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Russia's calling in foreigners to lend her a hand, and 
the foreigners eventually getting the upper hand. 

From the time of Peter the Great on, the chart of 
Russian independence is as jagged and irregular as a 
mountain range. Now the people would approach 
freedom, now it was far from them. The political ex- 
perience of the masses in these past 300 years may well 
be defined as an endeavor "to assert their own nation- 
ality in their own country." 

The reign of Catherine the Great saw the people 
once more endowed with a semblance of control of 
their own affairs. Provincial and district assemblies 
of the Noblesse were instituted, the officers being elec- 
tive; and a Commission, a representative convention 
of all the people, was called, but failed to materialize 
as a legislative body. 

The next notable strikes upward were the freeing of 
the serfs in 1861 by Alexander II, the creation of 
courts of justice, and the establishing of the Zemstvos, 
the provincial assemblies elected by all classes of the 
people. 

The next great step which has brought the Russian 
people nearer to the attainment of their original 
state of democracy was the enactment of the Organic 
Laws of October, 1905, and the Manifesto of March, 
1906, whereby two legislative bodies were created, 
viz. : 

The Imperial Council (Gosudarstivenni Sovet), a 
body much after the manner of the old Boyarskaza 
Douma, one-half of whose members are appointed by 
the Tsar and the other half elected by the Zemstvos 
and municipalities; and 

The Imperial Douma (Gosudarstivenni Douma)^ an 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 49 

elective assembly in which all classes and creeds are 
represented on equal footing. 



in 

The Government of Russia can be cross-sectioned 
just as were the social classes in Chapter I. 

At the head stands the Emperor, direct descendant 
of Mikail Romanov, who was chosen by the people. 
In him is vested the absolute authority. He can pro- 
mulgate legislation and veto it. In this respect, how- 
ever, his power is limited for, to quote the statute, "No 
new law may be promulgated without the assent of 
the Imperial Council and the Imperial Douma or en- 
forced without the sanction of the monarch." In addi- 
tion the Emperor is the supreme command of the army 
and navy, and the protector of the Church. 1 While 
nominally standing alone, he is actually supported by 
the prestige and offices of the royal family. Abso- 
lutism finds only its ultimate expression in his decrees. 

For the execution of this power, authority is dele- 
gated to twelve Ministers of State, composing the Cabi- 
net Council. The members are nominated by the Em- 
peror and retain their portfolios subject to his approval. 
These are the ministries of Foreign Affairs, War, Navy, 
Finance, Education, Ways of Communications, Justice, 
Commerce and Industry, Imperial Court, Agricultural, 
Internal Affairs and Government Control. In addition 
to the Cabinet Council there are other executive institu- 
tions, the Cabinet, however, being the most important. 

The Emperor is required to take deacon's orders in the Orthodox 
Church before ascending the throne. His assumption of these orders 
is part of the coronation ceremonies. As head of both Church and 
State he then crowns himself. 



50 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Divine authority is protected and maintained by 
five agencies: (A) The Bureaucracy, which comprises 
the total body of administrative officers; (B) Govern- 
ors of the Administrative Districts of which there are 
78, 1 in whom rests the direct supervision of the dis- 
trict and who are responsible to the Tsar alone; (C) 
the Secret Police, commonly referred to as "The Third 
Division," or Okhrana, a detective system operating 
separately from the local police force. In addition, 
(D) the Church, as a branch of the State, owing its 
financial and temporary powers to the autocracy, can 
be counted as an upholder of the Absolute authority. 
To this list must be added (E) the Censor, who con- 
trols the printed word. 

The highest juridical institution of the Empire is 
the Senate, which, in its various divisions and sub- 
divisions, safeguards the law and exercises justice. The 
Senators are all appointed by the Tsar and hold the 
rank of Privy Councilor. Legislation must receive the 
sanction of the Senate before it becomes a law. It is 
in the Senate that much legislation is lost, owing to its 
alleged illegality. 

Thus from the lowest ispravnik or district officer in 
the smallest hamlet to the Tsar himself, the pyramid 
of bureaucracy rears itself. 

A gigantic weight? Yes. For the weight rests upon 
the people, and the pyramid is so constructed as to re- 
sist pressure — theoretically. Logically it would seem 
that this weight might be lifted by one of three 
methods: the growing strength of the masses; the 
crumbling of the pyramid itself through sheer decay, 

1 In European Russia are 49 Government Districts; in Poland, 10 
(until the war) ; in Finland, 8 ; in the Caucasus, 7 ; and in Siberia, 4. 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 51 

and under vicious assault from below; or finally by- 
pressure and attack from nations without. 

One by one these three methods have been tried with 
more or less success. The revolt of the Decembrists 
in 1725 brought but little good, and the work of the 
Nihilists in the '70's of the past century worked but 
a negligible benefit. The combination of pressure from 
foreign lands — either friendly or unfriendly — the 
growth of education and the increase of industries will 
undoubtedly bring to the Russian people the necessary 
reforms. This combined movement has been gaining 
strength since the beginning of the present century. 
The necessary cohesion was given it by the war. 



IV 

Of the two legislative bodies the Imperial Council is 
the older, having been established first as an advisory 
legislative body without the power of initiating legis- 
lation, its members being all appointed by the Em- 
peror. By the reform laws of 1905 the advisory char- 
acter of this chamber was changed and it became the 
upper house of the Russian Parliament, and to a de- 
gree a representative elective body. 

The Emperor appoints half the members, including 
the President and Vice-President, thus retaining a ma- 
jority of seats. The President holds his office for life 
or at the will of the Emperor. There are 196 mem- 
bers in the present Council; 18 representing the no- 
bility, 6 the universities and academies, 12 the mer- 
chants' guilds of the municipalities, 34 the Ze?nstvos, 
and 22 the landed proprietors. They are elected for a 
term of nine years, one-third being seated at a time. 



52 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

The Emperor may remove any member he chooses and 
order a new election. 

The functions of the Imperial Council are identical 
with the Douma's; it has the power to initiate legisla- 
tion and vote budgets. It also exercises certain admin- 
istrative and judicial authority in such matters as the 
prosecution of high officials and the supervision of cer- 
tain financial and railway matters. 

For a matter of actual fact, very little legislation 
starts in the Imperial Council, its efforts being mainly 
directed either to the ratification or rejection of pro- 
posed bills sent up from the Douma. From the Im- 
perial Council a bill, having had the ratification of both 
houses, is handed over to the Cabinet Council, then 
to the Emperor for his signature. Midway its course 
may be halted by the Council, which may deem it an 
unwise measure, or by the Senate, which may judge it 
illegal. 



Both constitutionally and ethnologically the Douma 
can be compared to no house of representatives in the 
world. Its numbers include all creeds, walks of life 
and levels of intellect. Its representatives come from 
half a dozen races, speak as many tongues, yet all have 
equal footing. Freedom of speech is permitted, and, 
unless a member deliberately talks sedition, he is al- 
lowed the greatest liberty of expression. The reports 
of these speeches, freely reported in the municipal and 
provincial press, form a mass of evidence quite con- 
trary to the conception Americans have of the rigid 
censorship exercised over political discussion in Russia. 
The Government does object to indiscriminate discus- 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 53 

sion by people whose words will only cause unrest. 
The Douma is the official place for talking over such 
matters; moreover, the electoral law designs to assem- 
ble there the men best fitted for discussing just such 
problems. 

The composition of the Douma and the history of 
the first two assemblies were matters of current news- 
paper and magazine report at the time, and the reader 
need only have his memory refreshed by a survey of 
the situation that brought the Douma into being. 

On the emancipation of the serfs in 1861, several 
hundred thousand acres of Government land were di- 
vided among the 43,000,000 liberated peasants on the 
understanding that they were to pay for it during the 
course of the next fifty years. In theory this was just; 
in actual practice it worked out unjustly for the ma- 
jority of the peasants. They had land, but they had 
to pay taxes. As freemen they were suddenly loaded 
with the responsibilities of citizenship. The growth of 
capital and industry caused a growth of the cities. Al- 
though the rural communities had their Zemstvos, the 
municipalities were not so organized, causing a breach 
between the urban proletariat and the peasant. 

The growth of the wealthy landowners who kept the 
peasants in debt through heavy taxation, the increased 
interest in peasant affairs through the V Narodny x 
Movement, the labor troubles consequent on the growth 
of labor far in advance of legislation for labor, and the 
defeat of the Government forces in Manchuria — all 
these culminated in a great unrest that scored an active 
revolution in 1905. Throughout the Empire revolts 

1 V Narodny — to the people, the practice common among intelli- 
gentia during the last century of living among the peasants and in- 
structing them. 



54 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

sprang up ; rioting was the order of the day. The hand 
of the Government was forced. A Douma was created 
— at first only a representative body of the rich, then 
a representation of all the classes. 

A great "lust for liberties" seized the Russian people. 
The first Douma was convened. Peasant leaders and 
socialists brought forward a mad program of reforms. 
When the Government refused to consider it, the rep- 
resentatives became embittered and unruly. Their 
anger swept through the country, the masses claiming 
that they had been deceived. A second Douma was 
convened. Its members were even more socialistic than 
those of the first, and upon them the mailed fist of 
the Government fell heavily. Stolypin, the Premier, 
one of the greatest men Russia has produced in modern 
times, ruled that pacification must come before legisla- 
tion, and he omitted no act to hasten the end of in- 
ternal disturbances. So summary were his methods 
and so swift x that by the time the third Douma assem- 
bled Russia was too cowed to fight and too absorbed 
in healing her wounds to give much regard to legisla- 
tion. 

From this maze of conflicting interests and revolts 
that harried and well-nigh dismembered Russia during 
1905-7 we are only now beginning to be able to 
analyze, in the light of the intervening ten years, just 
what part of the Russian people revolted with the defi- 
nite purpose of attaining self-government, and what 
part revolted because revolution was in the air and 
because it might bring freedom, license and the end of 

1 Between 1905-6, 26,000 persons were killed by the army and police, 
and 31,000 wounded; upwards of 175,000 were jailed. During 1908, 
the opening of the third Douma, 7,016 civilians were arrested and 
1,340 condemned to death. 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 55 

individual bondage to debt and taxes. Time has shown 
that an appalling amount of the revolution was misdi- 
rected energy and energy wasted, that a great deal of it 
was the mad riot of mobs hungry for blood and destruc- 
tion, and that, for foreign readers, an appreciable amount 
of it was the creation of imaginative newspaper corre- 
spondents. Mavor, in his Economic History of Rus- 
sia, has stated the situation in perfect justice: "In 
all the groups there seemed to rise a lust for power. 
There is no evidence of any widespread desire for popu- 
lar government with all its possibilities and risks. Al- 
though there was a clamor for an assembly convened 
for the purpose of formulating a constitution, few 
realized what such an assembly meant; and probably 
very few would have been disposed to accept the com- 
promises which any constitution formulated by any 
such assembly would have involved." 

According to American standards — or better, accord- 
ing to American ideals — the Douma has made a poor 
showing. It is not justly representative of the people 
any more than is our House of Representatives. More- 
over, its short ten years' annals read like a decline from 
brilliant though blind liberalism into a slough of 
deadly conservatism. The new broom, intending to 
sweep clean, only swept with a gigantic futile force 
that spent its energy in programs and fiery words. 

For that reason the first and second Doumas were 
failures, if we weigh their value according to their con- 
structive results. The representatives of the people de- 
manded rights that their constituents refused to sup- 
port either collectively or individually. The average 
Russian wasn't willing to do his bit. 

The third Douma passed as a perfunctory meeting 



56 THE RUSSIANS : AN INTERPRETATION 

of cowed legislative puppets who merely submitted to 
orders given them from above. In addition, that as- 
sembly was less representative of the people, since the 
Government and vested interests had gained a majority 
of seats. 

The present body showed a singular lack of activity 
at the beginning of the war. Its actions may 
well be attributed to stage fright, for until that 
hour the Douma had not faced so great a national 
crisis. It was still apparently conservative and quies- 
cent until March of this year, when its plans for the 
overthrow of the dark forces were consummated in 
a bloodless revolution that staggered the world. 

There was held over the Douma the power of the 
throne. On one occasion, the Third Douma and the 
Imperial Council refused to pass a law greatly desired 
by the Government, whereupon both bodies were dis- 
solved for three days, and the law promulgated by 
the Tsar, and then convened again. This is an ex- 
treme case, however, for the more recent influence of 
the Tsar and the bureaucrats has been tempered by a 
toleration that was almost commendable. This ar- 
bitrary control of legislation may be inconceivable to 
Americans until they find a parallel in their own his- 
tory. There have been presidents who assumed the 
privilege of initiating legislation and, because of their 
power over Congress, were fairly certain of its enact- 
ment. These methods can be seen in the administra- 
tions of Jefferson, Jackson and Wilson. Russia has 
read Montesquieu's Esprit de Lois, but she has no 
such document as the Federalist. 

Lack of progress in the Douma may also be at- 
tributed to another cause — the seeming inability of 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 57 

Russians to arrive anywhere as yet by deliberation and 
debate. Here in America, when we want to solve a 
knotty problem, we say, "Well, let's get together and 
talk it over." Generally we reach some conclusion 
that forms the basis for future action. In Russia they 
get together and talk — Heaven knows, no people under 
the sun love to talk so much as the Russ! — but they 
rarely arrive at any definite conclusion. Compared 
with some of the oratory (sic) in our own House of 
Representatives, the Douma oratory makes a fair show- 
ing; as an effective agency, however, it produces a 
profligacy of words and a paucity of constructive ideas. 
The embryo Russ statesman lacks the ability to get 
down to the point; he is eternally circumlocutory. 

One thing about the Douma is certain; it is just be- 
ginning to learn to run the machinery of legislation. 
It is still, after these ten years, little more than a train- 
ing school for the men who are powers in their own 
districts and who will be powers in days to come. Per- 
haps its greatest weakness is the fact that the elective 
system which brings together these various and varied 
members is complicated, unjust and, in many instances, 
a farce. 

Yet the hope of the Russian people lies in this 
Douma. Wise men among them do not look for per- 
fection in legislation or perfection in the system on 
which the elections are based. And it is well that the 
members of this body are not altogether given their 
head. Democracy in Russia is still in the making; 
great tasks still lie before it. Progress, tempered with 
conservatism, will be the secret of success. Russia will 
make haste only by going slowly. 



58 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

VI 

In one department of self-government at least, the 
Russian people are fast making progress — in the 
Zemstvos: 

These rural assemblies were established in 1864, 
three years after the Emancipation, and have been 
steadily growing in power and usefulness ever since. 
They are of two kinds: (1) The Executive Boards 
(Uprava) of the small town, equivalent to our select 
townsmen, and (2) the Assemblies of the Govern- 
mental Districts, the membership of which is composed 
of representatives elected from among the members 
of the smaller boards. The president of the local board 
is the elected starosta or elder of the town ; in the larger 
groups the Marechal de Noblesse is the head. A pre- 
ponderance of seats in the larger assemblies is held by 
the nobility, a logical apportionment, since the gentry 
own most of the land and contribute most generously 
to its improvement. The procedures of both the local 
and district Zemstvos are subject to the supervision of 
the Governor as representative of the Imperial power. 

Nominally the province of the Zemstvos' activities 
includes such matters as schools and school teachers, 
improvement of roads and bridges, adjustment of taxes, 
charities, fire protection and similar town and district 
affairs. In many instances they enjoy the financial aid 
of the Government, especially in the school budgets. 
In no case are the taxes levied by the Zemstvos to ex- 
ceed 3% of the total valuation of property. 

The story of the Zemstvos is not altogether a con- 
stant record of progress. They have suffered from their 
apprenticed hand, their lack of practical knowledge of 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 59 

procedure and a weakness for fantastic action. Again 
and again have their procedures been blocked by reac- 
tionary members of the bureaucracy, and even in such 
late statesmen as Count Dmitry Tolstoy and Count 
Witte did they find active enemies. To this day they 
meet with prohibitions from the Zemsky Natchalniks 
and Peasants' Commissioners, who control the com- 
munal institutions of 43 of the governments. 

It is a fact characteristic of Russian life that in de- 
feat have the Zemstvos found victory. The very mis- 
fortunes of the people have given them their most active 
stimulus to growth and prestige. 

During the past two generations there have been 
times when the Government, finding itself utterly help- 
less in the face of great crises, has been obliged to call 
on the Zemstvos for aid. Thus it was in the famines 
of 1898 and 1910, thus it was in the Japanese War, 
and so it has been in the present struggle. Not only 
have the Zemstvos proved themselves loyal, but they 
have quite shamed the Government by the dispatch and 
energy of their labors and contributions. Through the 
Zemstvos are the peasants being taught modern farm- 
ing methods. Through the Ze?nstvos has been waged 
war against epidemics and plagues. 

When the Government failed to meet the Red Cross 
demands of the Japanese War, there arose the Union 
of All Zemstvos^ which undertook the work and carried 
it on to a satisfactory ending. This union for national 
work gave the assemblies an unprecedented solidarity, 
and, due to this solidarity among the people, was the 
movement for the Douma pushed on to a favorable 
conclusion. Not revolution but evolution of the will 
of the people brought the Douma into being. Since 



60 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

then there have been congresses of agriculturists from 
the Zemstvos and other meetings of the Union repre- 
sentatives which indicate the growing power of these 
district assemblies. In 1912 their efforts to reorganize 
the local courts met with success in a favorable statute, 
peasant judges being elected to decide minor cases and 
administer local customs, their decisions being re- 
spected by the judges of the higher courts elected by 
the district assemblies. 

The present war has brought the Zemstvo Union into 
serious prominence. It has joined with the Union 
of the Municipalities to establish and support hos- 
pitals, hospital trains, hospital and army stores, and 
to increase the supply of munitions. To quote one ac- 
tivity alone, the Zemstvos made and delivered, in ex- 
actly two months of 1914, 7,500,000 complete suits of 
underwear for the army. Their other activities have 
been equally swift and efficient. The union is now 
working on the sanitation of towns, the housing of 
the 2,000,000 refugees which still remain from the re- 
treat from Poland, Lithuania and Volhynia, and a 
program of improvements to be undertaken after the 
war. In short, the labors of the Zemstvos have passed 
from merely district affairs to national, and the in- 
terests of the people even in the smallest towns have 
been turned from petty local problems and disputes to 
those great national affairs that Russia faces to-day 
and will face to-morrow. 

VII 

Glancing through even this brief outline of the Gov- 
ernment, it is possible to discern many points where 
provision is deliberately made for the bureaucracy to 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 61 

drive conservative and reactionary wedges into the ma- 
chinery of liberal legislation and self-government. As 
representatives of the Emperor, responsible to him 
alone, the governors and governors-general have a con- 
trolling voice in the Zemstvos. Higher up, the Imperial 
Council and Senate are so constituted as to exercise a 
prohibitory influence over the Douma. Thus the at- 
tempts of the people at self-government are, in a meas- 
ure, checkmated by the bureaucracy. 

At this point the question is naturally raised, How 
can Russia ever expect to advance with such reaction- 
ary influence constantly retarding the course of prog- 
ress"? The answer to this problem, misunderstood or 
misjudged, is the rock on which much sympathy with 
Russia splits. 

Analyze the question and immediately it divides it- 
self into two separate propositions : ( 1 ) What do we 
mean by Russia — the Government as the nation, or the 
people as a conglomerate mass? (2) Are the mass of 
the people in a sufficiently enlightened state to under- 
take free and unguided control of their own affairs'? 

Granted that a solidarity of government is requisite 
for the well-being and progress of a nation, it is evident 
that in Russia, as in any other nation, there must be a 
government that will act for the people both in in- 
ternal and foreign affairs. Were the Government of 
Russia handed over completely to the masses to-day, 
indescribable chaos would ensue. Within a month the 
Russian Empire would be divided into a dozen warring 
factions — a condition from which other nations would 
not be slow to profit. 

Up to March, 1917, Russian revolutions invariably 
lacked a unity of purpose. There has always been 



62 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

a rush for liberties. The principle of every-man-grab- 
for-himself has been all too evident and, in a measure, 
has been responsible for the failure of the revolutions. 
The present international struggle has done much to 
give the people a unified purpose. Unlike the Japanese 
War, which was conducted by and for the bureaucracy 
at the expense of the people's interests, the present war 
finds the people devoted heart and soul to the cause. 

The other question : "Are the people in a sufficiently 
enlightened state to undertake free and unguided con- 
trol of their own affairs'?" is best answered by the sta- 
tistics on education. During the reign of the present 
emperor more has been accomplished for education than 
during any other epoch, but the situation is still far 
from desirable or even promising. Only 21% of the 
population can read and write. 1 On an average the 
Government devotes only 6% of its budget to educa- 
tion, although between 1907 and 1912 the expenditure 
was doubled. The greatest activity has been shown 
by the Zemstvos, which now devote an average of 30% 
of their budgets to education. 

According to the latest available statistics (1914), 
there are 127,477 schools of all kinds in the Empire, 
with a total attendance of 8,030,088 pupils. Both the 
Douma and the Zemstvos are seriously considering this 
problem of education, and it is not unlikely that after 
the war this will be an avenue of great progress, full 
of promise to those who look for Russian democracy. 

The question of the ability of the people to govern 
themselves also depends on the condition of the mass 
of the people. Until 1914 Russia possessed a peasantry 

1 The figures for Spain and Portugal, incidentally, were not far in 
advance of the Russian a few years ago. 



A DEMOCRACY IN THE MAKING 63 

and a proletariat that suffered from the attacks of two 
implacable enemies, excess of drink and lack of work. 
The one was permitted by the Government, the other 
was due to the long winters during which work on the 
farms came to a standstill. The growth of industries 
consequent on the war has given the peasant something 
to do. The universal adoption of temperance has given 
the moujik a clear head. He saves his money now, he 
commits less crime and is given to less folly. More- 
over, he can think now whereas before he only talked. 

The social reforms that the war has brought will 
undoubtedly leave their marks on the Government. 
Because of their increased ability to govern themselves, 
the Zemstvos will doubtless be given more opportunity 
for the exercise of that right. There will be a quicken- 
ing of interest in their behalf, and the privilege will be 
extended to those districts that as yet have not been 
granted a Zemstvo government. In a word, from the 
lowest member of the Zemstvo to the representatives in 
the Douma, Russia will be going to school to learn self- 
government by experimental methods. 

Considering the situation in this light, one can read- 
ily see the wisdom of continuing the semblance of 
dynastic direction for some little time. By this 
I do not mean to infer that the bureaucracy is uni- 
versally moved by any highly idealistic altruism for 
the welfare of the people and the progress of the gov- 
ernment. Far from it. Russia has her Mark Hannas 
and her Chauncey M. Depews. The bureaucrat is hu- 
man and the grab spirit is strong within him. But 
I do mean to impress the point that not all aristocrats 
are bureaucrats, nor have all bureaucrats been dyed- 
in-the-wool thieves, grafters and poltroons. There are 



64 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

bureaucrats in favor to-day, and more of them are 
coming into favor as the days go on, who have a 
lively liberal consciousness, who are moved by high, 
progressive ideals. And in their hands the interests 
of the people are safe. 

Meantime, what will become of the revolutionist? 



CHAPTER IV 

THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 

TWENTY years from now the rarest thing in 
Russia will be the revolutionist. Already the 
melodramatic, wild-haired, wan-faced, blear- 
eyed Nihilist is passing away. Youths who a decade 
previous hurled bombs had almost all gone into busi- 
ness when the war started. 1 Business pays, bombs do 
not. What bloody revolution failed to accomplish, 
peaceful economic evolution is accomplishing. Twenty 
years, and the martyr type of which we read so much 
in our daily press will be as extinct as the dinosaur. 



There is that indescribable element in almost every 
Russ which impels him to be, like the Irishman at 
Castle Garden, "agin" things generally. 

I have always suspected that that Irishman had been 
drinking, and was out of a job. Constant discontent 
is an offspring of constant alcoholic stimulation and 
the lack of something to do. It is engendered by ennui 
and mad passion. 

1 This statement can safely be made despite the strikes and labor 
troubles that broke out in Russia in 1914. Since the war it has been 
discovered that much of this unrest was engineered by the German 
Embassy with the view of damaging Russian credits abroad. It will 
be recalled that German agents employed the same labor methods in 
their efforts to stop the manufacture and shipment of munitions here 
in America. 

65 



66 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Until 1914, when the Tsar's ukase prohibiting the 
manufacture and sale of vodka was promulgated, 
vodka, the raw potato whiskey of the masses, did more 
to prevent the peasant from improving his lot than any- 
single agency. Private firms manufactured it and the 
Government distributed it, earning thereby the tidy 
sum of $300,000,000 a year. An average of one vodka 
kabak (dram-shop) to every 200 souls was the gener- 
ous way the peasant was accommodated. Yet it was 
among these very peasants that the prohibition move- 
ment started. By 1905 so strong had grown the senti- 
ment against the traffic that the Peasants' Union re- 
solved to rid themselves of the Government gin-shops 
by no less a measure than forcible destruction. 

This was not, however, the usual procedure. Local 
option had been extended to the Zemstvos, and they 
proceeded to exercise the privilege. With singularly 
clear foresight they comprehended — what those in 
power completely failed to grasp until the exigencies 
of war forced it upon them — that it is anything but 
fair weather "when good fellows get together with a 
stein on the table." No good song rang clear through 
the peasant land; famine and disease stalked in the 
reeling moujik's tracks, and after them came the Jew 
money-lender. The peasant suffered, his wife suffered, 
his children suffered, and his fields gave scant increase. 

The full-breasted Russian mother contributes nobly 
her share. She customarily has anywhere from six to 
twelve children, of which one-third die. The infant 
mortality of 32.7% puts Russia at the head of the 
Powers in this lamentable particular. The average 
mortality of 29% gains her a similar undesirable place. 
Vodka has had much to do with this alarming mor- 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 67 

tality, for the baba, the moujik wife, shared her hus- 
band's weakness for the bottle. 

Drunkenness, moreover, bred laziness, and the 
farmer whose land was a long distance from town neg- 
lected it or cultivated it carelessly. Famine came — 
in 1898 and again in 1910 — when the people of twenty 
governments went starving because the crops had 
failed. 

To recapitulate, in the past the moujik has been 
over-stimulated alcoholically. He also has had scarcely 
enough to keep him busy the year round. This condi- 
tion has existed for generations. Little wonder that 
in the moujik' s soul smoulders the spirit of discontent. 
Part of it is discontent with himself; part, justifiable 
envy of the lot of others ; and, to give him his full due, 
the major part is the lot imposed upon him by mal- 
administration. Eighty per cent of the population of 
Russia is moujik, while the entire rural population con- 
stitutes 86%. A great portion of the political and 
economic problems of Russia, then, concern themselves 
with the moujik — the man on the farm. The things 
he revolts against are, in the main, the revolting points 
of Russia. 

He revolts against debt; against taxes which keep 
him in debt; against the amount of land apportioned 
to him, as against that owned by his more fortunate 
fellows, or by the gentry; against the control of his 
local assemblies by representatives of the bureaucracy; 
against exploitation by political factions and by Jews ; 
and in some instances against the Church. The censor 
holds but little terror for him, since he is generally too 
illiterate to write or read, but he has a wholesome and 
logical regard for the gendarme and ispravnik, who are 



68 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

apt to overhear his fervid speeches and clap him into 
jail until he cools off. 

An empty stomach, an empty larder, a ruined field — 
these seem to be, in the long run, the most cogent forces 
which drive the moujik to revolt. 1 While by no means 
all moujiks are poverty-stricken and bound by debt, a 
great majority are in constantly straitened circum- 
stances as a result of poor crops, brought about partly 
by "the acts of God," as the insurance policy puts it, 
partly by ignorance of up-to-date agricultural methods, 
lack of modern farming machinery and utensils, the 
inevitable vodka, sheer laziness, and the way in which 
the land was distributed prior to the Stolypin land re- 
forms. The Government and the Zemstvos are en- 
deavoring to alleviate much of this distress by estab- 
lishing agricultural schools and farming credits. Ac- 
cording to the latest available figures (1913) there are 
more than 300 special agricultural schools, as well as 
210 experiment stations — a total of 5,000 instructors 
in all — the majority of them being supported by the 
Zemstvos. The congestion on the farms and the unfair 
distribution of land are being solved by emigration to 
Siberia and by the working of the Stolypin reforms of 
1907, just referred to, whereby 36,000,000 acres were 
redistributed and 2,000,000 acres added to the public 
lands, making 2,000,000 new farms in all, which are 
owned and cultivated by the peasants. 

The moujik' s distrust of the Jew has a reasonable 
basis. The Jew with whom he is concerned is either 

1 Some of the peasant revolt is quite incomprehensible — save one 
attribute it to distrust and ignorance — and many of his uprisings 
are of a character that makes one lose sympathy for him. Thus in 
the cholera epidemic of 1902 peasants deliberately destroyed hospitals 
erected for their care, and killed doctors and nurses. It was another 
expression of the "agin" attitude. 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 69 

a middleman or a money-lender. In both capacities his 
methods have been objectionable and his interests 
usurious, for he takes advantage of ignorance and pov- 
erty. The average moujik is not shrewd; the average 
Jew is, and in a bargain the moujik is worsted nine 
times out of ten. The Jew holds the mortgage over 
his head like a club. He is the only crow that fattens 
in a famine land. With one great cause for debt — 
vodka — abolished, the moujik may be able to get on 
his financial feet, and the story may be changed. In 
addition, the Zemstvos in many districts have replaced 
the Jew as middleman for the sale of crops and espe- 
cially for the sale of Kustarny, the peasant handicraft 
wares. 

So far as the peasant's personal feeling is concerned, 
he revolts against the Church only in a good-natured 
fashion. The custom of feeing the clergy either by 
cash or by kind often falls as a heavy burden on him. 
During the peasant troubles of 1905 the natives of the 
village of Mashkova Suren, to quote one example, went 
so far as to draw up their own table of church charges : 
3 roubles instead of 8 for a marriage; one rouble in- 
stead of 3 for a funeral; 12 copecks instead of 50 
for a baptism and burial; and 20 copecks instead of 
one rouble for thanksgivings. The moujik also has a 
case against the Church for the idleness which it forces 
upon him. As there are 124 feast-days on which no 
work is supposed to be done, in addition to the fifty- 
two Sundays, the farmer is deprived of a goodly share 
of his working year. 

There is still a third phase of his economic position 
in regard to the Church: At the present counting the 
Church owns some 6,750,000 acres of land in the most 



70 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

fertile regions, the center and south of Russia, which it 
is making no effort to improve. This land is rented 
to the peasants at a rate that is scarcely generous, to 
say the least. Finally, it is the Church that is the most 
relentless foe of popular education and the one barrier 
which stands between the ignorant peasant and the 
light of ordinary schooling. 



II 

Unquestionably the war has been the greatest stim- 
ulus for the betterment of the peasants individually. 
It has raised the standard of living. This can be seen 
by the increase in savings deposits. To quote the fig- 
ures assembled by the Russian journalist, W. T. 
Tcherkesoff, "Before the war the average yearly sav- 
ings deposits were between 7,500,000 and 8,000,000 
roubles. During the first year, when vodka was pro- 
hibited, they rose to 53,000,000, and in the first six 
months of 1916 to 60,000,000 roubles. The State 
Bank, which had formerly 7,400 savings banks in the 
country, during the war has been obliged to double that 
number." 

Although some critics might read in these figures 
only the effect of the vodka prohibition, it must be re- 
membered that the war opened up many more oppor- 
tunities for making money than the peasant ever be- 
fore possessed. Whereas previously the winter months 
were spent in idleness, the peasants now are kept busy 
at Zemstvo and municipality work, in making muni- 
tions and in the factories. This new-found prosperity 
has not been without evil results, however. The quick 
wages and the unprecedented size of them have bred 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 71 

in the peasant a sudden capacity for forgetting the 
rights of others. Peasants have refused to ship to the 
cities any of their hams, for example, because the Gov- 
ernment fixed the maximum price, which the moujik 
farmer was not pleased to accept. Consequently, while 
the countryside in Russia has had plenty to eat during 
the war, the food situation in the cities was very grave. 
Sudden wealth, like sudden liberty, is a dangerous boon 
to grant an ignorant peasantry. 

The war has brought the moujik as a class the bene- 
fit of solidarity in his Union of All Zemstvos and in 
the cooperation of the Zemstvos with the municipali- 
ties. Although as yet the work is mainly Red Cross, 
this solidarity will bear fruit in the sympathies of the 
peasants. Soldiers coming back from the front will 
bring the added benefit of having mingled with troops 
from other parts of the Empire and from other lands. 

As a whole, the war has given the Russian people a 
singleness of ideal — Russia. It has made them more 
patriotic and more religious. Relentlessly has it shown 
them who was friend and who was foe. It has made 
them work, and the work has come in new channels, 
for moujik and urban proletariat alike have bene- 
fited by the necessary growth of industries consequent 
on the war. 

in 

The revolt of the intelligentia and the urban pro- 
letariat is quite a different matter from the discontent 
of the moujik on the land. In the one case the problem 
is agrarian, in the other, industrial and political. 

In the towns and cities the cause of much discontent 
is the refusal of the Government to recognize labor 



72 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

unions; the censorship, which is at once destructive 
to thought, stupid, and a prohibition that only pro- 
vokes and invites fracture ; the Church as a corporation 
that enjoys immense privileges and at the same time 
an enormous income; the excessive and unscrupulous 
activities of the Third Division and its agents provo- 
cateurs; and the Government's attitude toward labor 
and the working classes generally. 

Among the intelligentia must be classed the uni- 
versity students who in the past have been an active 
revolting element. 

In this respect it would be a blessing to Russia were 
the gendarmerie and Third Division gifted with the 
faculty — so amply possessed by the American police — 
of "looking the other way." Active and destructive 
revolt in Russia has often been the doing of adolescents, 
the idealistic madness of undergraduates and of men 
and women with sophomoric minds. This statement is 
not intended to belittle the heroism and sacrifices of 
countless noble souls who have poured out their life- 
blood for Russian freedom; but the fact remains that 
much revolt has been a lamentable waste of misdi- 
rected youthful energy. 

The sanest method of handling such cases is to ig- 
nore the activity altogether, let revolutionists speechify 
and write until their wrath is assuaged. Forbid it, 
and the evil only grows and authority loses respect. 
As even Count Witte expressed it, "Nothing is more 
apt to ruin the prestige of authority than frequent and 
extensive employment of repression." 

Many a Russian revolutionist has suffered more 
from pent-up expression than from burning ideals, 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 73 

more from being provoked into revolt by the police 
than from altruistic enthusiasm. 

If Russian college lads would only learn to play 
baseball and football and tennis (games are practically 
unknown in Russian universities), half the student 
trouble would be avoided. Revolt and the zeal to re- 
form the world are well-defined stages of adolescence. 
American lads suffer as much from it as do Russian, 
only the American lad kicks and runs it out of his sys- 
tem. Russia spends to-day the huge sum of $30,000,- 
000 yearly on ordinary police activities and main- 
tenance, and $4,000,000 to maintain the gendarmerie. 
Think what different reading the story of the Russian 
universities would make were one-tenth of that sum 
invested in stadiums,' athletic fields and athletic equip- 
ment! 

The agent provocateur is another development of the 
secret police activities that is wholly despicable and 
stupid. Intended to nip trouble in the bud, it is more 
often employed to cover up the misdeeds and failures 
of officials. When national crises appear, such as the 
present war, the value of a secret police is apparent 
and no nation can afford to be without it. But living 
under a constant fear of police surveillance and police 
investigation, knowing not who is friend and who is 
foe, stupefies the conscience of a people, deadens the 
moral sense and all too often — as shown by the reac- 
tion of some of the intelligentia after 1906 — results in 
either a relapse into decadence or a retreat into vague 
and inactive mysticism. 

The freedom for which the people have recently 
struck is a freedom for safe and normal living — the 
right to live without eternally looking back. 



74 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

IV 

The censorship of Russian newspapers and maga- 
zines is unquestionably an affront and a burden to 
intelligent readers. I believe the burden is more dif- 
ficult to bear there because the censorship is more ob- 
vious in Russia than in any other land. Here in 
America we speak of "muzzling" the press; in Russia 
they speak of censoring it. The difference lies in the 
methods employed and the final printed appearance of 
the journal. In America the censoring is done before 
the paper goes to press and is accomplished in the 
office of the owner or at the desk of the managing 
editor, who has his orders from "higher up." In 
Russia the galley sheets or the printed paper is sub- 
mitted to the censor who, having his orders from 
"higher up," cuts out or blacks over the forbidden pas- 
sages. The American paper does not look censored, the 
Russian is obviously so. 

There have been numberless occasions when the cen- 
sorship of the press has been used to cover up the fail- 
ures and misdeeds of officials in Russia, but cannot the 
same be said of the American press at times'? 

Censorship forbids the free expression of opinion. 
Now, the Russian newspaper contains very little news 
and a great deal of opinion in the form of editorials, 
essays, critiques and feuilletons. What the thinking 
people think about a situation interests readers in 
Russia more than the things that actually happen. 
Hence there is a greater expression of opinion per se 
than there is in American newspapers and a greater op- 
portunity for running counter to the opinions of the 
censor. Expression of opinion in American journals is 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 75 

practically limited to two or three columns of edito- 
rials, a few letters from readers, a cartoon and a humor- 
ist's column. The rest is news, and between newspa- 
pers is the liveliest competition not to miss news items, 
so that it is practically impossible to censor a news 
item out of all the papers. "Muzzling" the press in 
America invariably comes from a financial source, 
rather than a political, as it does in Russia. Thus, pre- 
vious to the war the criticism of German methods in 
Russia was universally censored. Again, in New York 
City six months before the arrival of Billy Sunday the 
editorial writers and humorists were free to criticize 
that evangelist's methods all they wished; but so soon 
as certain moneyed interests undertook to finance the 
campaign in New York the order went forth to every 
newspaper office in the city forbidding adverse criti- 
cism of Sunday. In other words, the free expression 
of thinking men in newspaper offices was censored be- 
fore it found expression on paper. Little wonder that 
the Russians refer to "Yankee tricks" ! 



The Russian liberal is a different person from the 
revolutionist in that, in the majority of cases, his bump 
of level-headedness is more pronounced, and he recog- 
nizes that lasting reform can come only by slow stages 
and through legitimate channels. He is not restricted 
to any one class, and his numbers are increasing every 
day. Because of this Russia will pay more attention 
to her liberal men of influence than she has in the past. 
The European War has forced liberalism on Russia 
through the two agencies of economic and military 



76 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

necessity and her dealings with powers in which liberal- 
ism is more firmly established. 

Reactionary bureaucrats can readily read the writ- 
ing on the wall. They know that, once liberalism 
creeps into legislation to any extent, the business of 
being a reactionary will have its disadvantages. From 
the very beginning the bureaucracy has taken its toll 
of "graft," and few members of it, indeed, have been 
above the persuasion of the easily earned coin. This 
was the awful revelation of the Japanese War and of 
the opening months of the present struggle. "The co- 
hesive power of public plunder" was enormous. That 
much of it has been broken and its upholders penalized 
by death or imprisonment stands to the credit of those 
in authority. 

VI 

The Jew is a turbulent political and economic factor 
in Russia, and, as one cause of unrest, cannot be passed 
over without a survey of his status. 

By the Government and by the bulk of the popula- 
tion the Jew is considered a foreigner. This fact should 
always be remembered in judging the Jewish situation, 
because — whether one agrees with it or not — it ex- 
plains the Pale, or segregation of Jews into restricted 
areas, and is the reason for the average Russian's vio- 
lent expression of disgust when foreigners class Russian 
Jews as Russians. 

To Americans all Russians are alike; to Russians 
there is a clear-cut distinction between national and 
racial affinities. The Russian is a loyal subject, he 
loves his motherland and is generally willing to stay 
there. The Jew, on the other hand, will migrate wher- 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 77 

ever there is opportunity for making money. More 
than nine-tenths of the emigrants from Russia to for- 
eign lands come to the United States. Of them, 41% 
are Jews, $.5°/o Germans, 5.9% Finns, 25% Poles, 
10.2% Letts and Lithuanians and 11.3% Russians 
proper. 

Because of her classification of the Jew as a for- 
eigner, the Russian Government is making no haste to 
conclude a new commercial treaty with the United 
States. As neither party loses very much, so far as 
mutual commercial benefits are concerned, Russia sees 
little necessity for backing down from her position. 

The discrimination against Jews takes two forms; 
the restriction of the number of Jews in the public 
schools, and the Pale already mentioned. Jews are 
permitted in the schools to the extent of 2% to 5% 
and even 10% in the Asiatic provinces. For those who 
are not so fortunate as to be included in the chosen 
group, there are private schools which require a fee for 
tuition. This is no misfortune for the Jew, since he 
has his own Kheder, Talmudtory and Eshiboty schools 
both in the Pale and in the cities, just as the Moham- 
medans have their own Medress and Melstelle. More- 
over, many sincere orthodox Jews object to the re- 
ligious teaching given in the public schools, as a form 
of intolerable proselytizing to which they will not sub- 
ject their children. It is my frank opinion in this mat- 
ter that the objection of the Jew to his educational 
exclusion is, in most cases, a matter of roubles and 
copecks. In the public schools he does not have to pay, 
in the private he does. 

The selection of the 2-5% causes many amusing inci- 
dents. Authorities who happen to have no sympathy 



78 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTEPPRETATION 

for their Semitic fellows will select the permitted per- 
centage from the top of the list — skim off the alpha- 
betical cream, as it were. Hence in many towns there 
is a great rush to change names about the time that the 
sons are ready for school ; you find Zambriskies becom- 
ing Abramovitches over night ! 

There are sixteen Cherta Osedlosti or lines of settle- 
ment in which Jews are permitted to reside; these in- 
clude Poland, where the Jews may live wherever they 
choose. The rule governing the Pale does not apply 
to non-Talmudical Jews, nor to dentists, druggists, 
merchants of the first and second guilds, nor to those 
who have a university education or its equivalent, nor 
to descendants of soldiers who fought under Nicholas 
I. In other words, only the lower class Jews are re- 
stricted to the Pale. 

Here again is a situation that Americans may find 
difficult to understand until they find a parallel in their 
own country. That parallel can be found in the "Save 
New York" Movement. During the past year mer- 
chants of New York City with business on Fifth Ave- 
nue have become alarmed at the unprecedented number 
of manufacturing lofts creeping up into the better shop- 
ping districts of that avenue. In order to "save New 
York," to save their business, they inaugurated a move- 
ment to restrict factories of this sort to a zone. The 
factories were objectionable for two reasons; they low- 
ered the value of property and at noontimes they 
flooded the pavements with sweat-shop workers — Jews 
to a man — whose congregating there made it both trou- 
blesome and offensive to desirable shoppers in that 
neighborhood. So the Fifth Avenue merchants have 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 79 

established a Pale beyond which sweat-shops cannot 
pass. They have even gone further; in order to en- 
force the Pale they have agreed to boycott those manu- 
facturers who do not respect the required limits. 

Were this action taken in Russia to-day, to-morrow 
our papers would be full of alarming reports on the 
cruel discrimination against Jews. As it happens in 
America, we call it "saving New York." New York 
merchants object no more to the desirable Jews than 
does the Russian, but they do seriously fear the com- 
mercial and real estate decline that inevitably results 
in a neighborhood on the swarming there of Semitic 
proletarians. 

There is another word that Americans have become 
accustomed to in reports from Russia. I refer to 
pogrom. A pogrom is not necessarily anti-Jewish; it 
is any kind of a riot. Thus, in one day — October 18th, 
1905 — pogroms took place in 200 cities, a counter- 
revolution against all revolutionists — Russian, Jewish 
or Tartar, conducted by mobs and directed by the 
Black Hundred, the reactionary society. During the 
troublous times of 1902-7, 40% of the revolutionists 
were Jews (in some districts 90%!), which accounts' 
for many of the subsequent riots against them, for the 
Jews more than once have exploited the moujik to 
attain their own political ends. "Jew-baiting," on the 
other hand, is a thoroughly despicable practice, con- 
demned by all Russians of standing as a custom that 
does more harm to Russia in one hour than she can 
undo in a year. 

The pogrom is no more defensible than any other 
riot, much less so when it arises out of a corner case 
of "Jew-baiting" by loafers. But because Jews have 



80 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

suffered in the consequent riots and in counter revolu- 
tions is no reason for supposing that they were wholly 
exonerated of blame. The Jew is just as capable of 
provoking popular fury as any other mortal. If the 
blow falls where his head happens to be, the blow is 
also falling where there happen to be the heads of both 
innocent and guilty Christians. 

The practice of the pogrom has its roots deep in the 
race of Russia. The Cossacks have always been the 
sworn foes of the Jew, or of anything, for that matter, 
that is not Orthodox. It is a racial hatred, a racial 
distrust, a racial fear. Some of it is caused by commer- 
cial jealousy; most of it is savagely primitive. In 
only two countries under the sun does racial hate take 
such violent forms — in Russia and America. And, 
after reading accounts of our lynching bees, can one 
blame the Russ for commenting on our inconsistency 
in criticizing him for his pogroms? 

Russia owes a great deal to the Jews and she will 
never forget her debt. They are among her bravest 
fighters — 250,000 of them. They have contributed 
musicians, scientists, authors, merchant princes and 
scholars to her ranks of great men. But — and this it 
is only fair to remember — there have been other great 
men in Russia beside Jews, just as there are other prob- 
lems beside the Jewish problem. 

Foreign writers invariably over-estimate the serious- 
ness of the Jewish situation, just as writers foreign to 
America over-estimate the negro problem and Tam- 
many Hall. Were America as bad as it is painted, we 
would be wholly occupied doing two things; suppress- 
ing and lynching negroes and prosecuting grafter poli- 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 81 

ticians; and these would constitute the sum total of 
our worries. 

The Jewish situation is only the smallest of a score- 
odd problems that adolescent Russia is trying to solve ; 
moreover, it is mainly a sectional problem, just as is 
the negro question. Out of a total population of 182,- 
000,000 souls, the Jews represent but 4.05%. There 
are more dissenters in Russia than Jews and, until the 
Edict of Toleration, their existence was no more se- 
cure than the Jews'. Why then paint the Jews as 
fighting for their life against Russia, or Russia as fight- 
ing for her life against the Jews? Russia is doing 
quite the opposite — she is speeding them to our shores ! 

What Russia has been fighting for her very life 
against are the Germans. 



VII 

When he said that Peter the Great opened a window 
on Europe for Russia to look through and learn how 
to conduct her household, Pushkin spoke conserva- 
tively. Peter flung open a door, a wide door. 

Up to that time the number of unassimilated for- 
eigners in Russia was negligible. Greeks had come in 
at the time of Ivan Ill's marriage with Sophia, and 
so had some Italians, for Sophia was educated in Rome 
and held a warm spot in her heart for the sons of Italia. 

The door that opened in the reign of Peter the Great 
disclosed Russia as a possible market for exploitation 
and commerce. Germans came and English, some 
French, some Swedish and some Scotch. You still en- 
counter Russians with very English and Scottish names, 
descendants of these first settlers, who know no word 



82 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

of English. The same can be said of the descendants 
of the early German settlers who came to Moscow, 
started the first foreign quarter of that city, built the 
first theater and laid the foundations of Russian dra- 
matic arts. 

Until 1915 one found a great scattering of Germans 
throughout the Empire, who were totally unabsorbed 
and obviously in Russia for none other than commer- 
cial purposes together, of course, with those espionage 
capacities in which all German commercial agents 
serve the Fatherland. Consequently one makes a re- 
markable discovery in visiting Russia; he can travel 
the length and breadth of the Empire and, unless he 
goes great distances from the railroads and towns, Ger- 
man will carry him everywhere. French and Polish 
are found among the upper classes ; English rarely, save 
in the case of a traveled merchant or an officer who will 
have a reading acquaintance with it. But in German 
all classes of any consequence have a good ground- 
ing. This was necessary. If one wanted to conduct 
business he had to speak German! And therein lies 
the story of the quiet, steady Prussian invasion of Rus- 
sia. For the past century the Germans have had Rus- 
sia hypnotized. For 300 years they have guided the 
hand of the Government. Only during the past two 
years have the people awakened to this fact. 

It would require a goodly-sized volume to tell in de- 
tail the entire story of Germany in Russia. In lieu 
of that we can only note here some of the salient points 
of the situation. 

The founding of the new capital in the north, St. 
Petersburg, attracted hosts of gentlemen adventurers, 
who lost no time in getting into the graces of those in 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 83 

power and in placing their hands on the reins of gov- 
ernment. These foreigners, mainly Germans, gained a 
predominant power. Intermarriage with German 
dynasties also sealed the tie of blood relationship. 
Barons of the Baltic Provinces began to come into their 
own. Learned Germans acquired high posts in the uni- 
versities and academies. By the time of the Empress 
Ann (1730-1740) German influence over the Russian 
Government had grown to such proportions that the 
favorite of the Empress was a German, Biron, who 
directed an unrelenting prosecution of all who ob- 
jected to German rule. It is one of the startling con- 
tradictions of Russian history that administrative exile 
to Siberia — among the darkest pages of Russia's story 
— was first instituted by a German for Russians who 
were anti-German! 

Catherine the Great, who while herself a Prussian 
was in many ways one of the most Russian of Russian 
monarchs, showed a decided weakness for Germans. 
She imported great colonies of German farmers to 
teach the Russian peasants the arts of agriculture and, 
to make their stay pleasant, gave each man 160 acres 
of the best land free of taxes, duties and military serv- 
ice, and granted the colonies the privilege of self-gov- 
ernment. 

Alexander I, a dreamer and idealist, sought his ideal 
for Russia in German manners and customs. His Holy 
Alliance was little more than a promise of Russian help 
to Austria and Prussia in the furthering of their dreams 
of empire. It was Alexander I who, on asking the 
great General Yermolov what reward he desired for 
his services to the State, was given the amazing reply, 



84 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

"To be promoted German; rewards would then follow 
of themselves." * 

Nicholas I, Alexander's successor, saw only one way 
for Russia to improve — by a wholesale adoption of 
German methods. This resulted in a great growth of 
the bureaucratic power, especially in the power of the 
Baltic Barons. In fact, so thoroughly did Nicholas 
believe in German methods and Germans generally 
that when charges of fraud were brought against two 
of them he dismissed the case, saying, "They being 
Germans could not have committed such a crime." The 
Minister of Foreign Affairs in this reign and in the 
early years of the reign of Alexander II was a German 
by the name of Nesselrode, who never in the course of 
his life took the trouble to learn Russian ! From that 
time on until the reign of Alexander III, the present 
emperor's immediate predecessor, German was the 
language of the Russian diplomatic circle and of diplo-> 
matic correspondence. 

German colonization of Russia began to assume seri- 
ous proportions during the reign of Alexander III, and 
the diplomatic relations of Russia with powers other 
than Germany took on a new character. During the 
reign of the present emperor Prussian statesmen have 
time and again guided the course of the Russian Gov- 
ernment. Prussian influence is discernible behind the 
Russo-Japanese War; it attempted to arouse bitter 
feeling against France — even threatening war when 
the French Entente was proposed. The Entente was 
consummated, and Germany forced to accomplish her 
ends by other means. 

Quoted in Russia and Democracy. By G. de Wesselitsky. Page 
22. New York, 1916. 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 85 

At this time started the systematic colonization of 
the frontier provinces of Russia — the Vistula region, 
the Baltic and southwest Russia. Colonies were 
planted in the immediate neighborhood of strategic 
points — railroads, bridges and such. Large German 
syndicates bought up the estates of Russian nobles and 
sold the land to German farmers, who developed it 
with cheap Russian labor. The commerce of the towns 
also fell into German hands. These various ^phases of 
the German invasion culminated in the Russo-German 
commercial treaty, which provides for Russia's sup- 
plying Germany with raw materials at a low rate and 
receiving them back in the manufactured form at a 
high rate. As a consequence of this invasion, the fron- 
tiers of Russia to the West were surrounded by peoples 
alien in sympathy to the country, many of whom were 
Teutonic spies; the industries were crippled and the 
commerce was at the mercy of German merchants. 

Germany played well her role in Russia. She con- 
trolled the press of the country to such an extent that, 
if a newspaper printed any articles with anti-German 
sentiments, it was forthwith censored out of existence. 
As for the news to foreign lands, that was wholly in 
German hands. Berlin is the news-distributing center 
for countries to the East, and German officials con- 
trolled what was sent out from Russia to the world. 
Reports of uprisings were out of all proportion to the 
fact; many were manufactured out of whole cloth. 
When news favorable to Russia came along, the Ber- 
lin censors quietly quashed it. Until the war started 
the good reports of Russia were mostly in German 
wastebaskets. 

With the opening of the war the Russian people 



86 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

awakened to the singular fact that their Government, 
their industries, their banks, their schools, their thea- 
ters, their papers and magazines, their shops and many 
of their farms were German or Germanized. In the 
early months of the war the Government was crippled 
because of the preponderance of Germans and Pro- 
Germans in it. Many were still there, even after 
two years and a half of war. Fortunately their situa- 
tion was far from pleasant. They were obliterated by 
the recent over-night revolution. 

The great economic and military weakness of Russia 
today lies in the fact that she has depended on Ger- 
many for far too many things. If she is to attain her 
majority among the powers, she must shake herself 
free of the German habit. Certainly, if she is to main- 
tain her standing with France and England she can 
no longer truckle to German influence and German or- 
ders, her revolutions can no longer be started at the 
whim of the German ambassador, nor the wheels of 
her industries stilled because German merchants wished 
them stilled. It is far more important for the Russian 
people to revolt against the German in their midst 
than against the bureaucracy as a system or the Jew 
as a turbulent political and economic factor. 

VIII 

Beyond stirring up popular interest, it is a debatable 
point if bloody revolutions in Russia succeed. Cer- 
tainly, sporadic nihilism has never brought permanent 
good to the Government or the people. It can never 
be the expression of the true will of the people, and its 
results — one or more bureaucrats less — have never 



THE THINGS HE REVOLTS AGAINST 87 

helped solve any problem; in fact, have worked quite 
the opposite, for invariably have they caused the 
clamps of reactionary administration to be applied 
tighter. 

If one reads history only in the light of its imme- 
diate causes and effects, the revolutionary troubles of 
1902-7 did bear fruit in the, establishment of the 
Douma. Looking across the grand panorama of Rus- 
sian history it appears, as was noted at the beginning 
of this chapter, more as a reversion to a type with 
which the early Slavs were well acquainted. 

The purpose of a revolution is to start something 
in action rather than to endow it with strength to 
perpetuate that action. It is a clearing of the slate, 
a forced balancing of the books. Although quite dif- 
ferent from reform, it is logical to expect reforms to 
follow on revolutions. 

In Russia this is not necessarily the case. The slate 
is rarely cleaned, the books rarely balanced. Once 
popular wrath has subsided, but few are interested 
enough to carry on the reforms to a definite working 
stage. Revolution in Russia has invariably been fol- 
lowed by a period of reaction; not that the revolution 
has been broken, but the interest of the people has been 
dispelled. Heretofore, invariably, has the substantial 
framework of reform government come from above, 
the constructive work of liberal aristocrats. 

Russian revolutions have lacked practical programs. 
They have also lacked a unified purpose and — what 
finally won the day for the French Revolution — the 
support of a middle class, the backing of a great urban 
proletariat. This proletariat Russia is only beginning 
to develop. The wide gulf between the nobility — 



88 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

which still numbers 15 to every 1,000 of the population 
— and the peasantry — which bulks 80% of the whole — 
is gradually being bridged by a class of industrial work- 
ers and shopkeepers. Fundamentally an agricultural 
nation, Russia suddenly discovered in this war the 
necessity for industries and found, at the same time, 
that she possessed the nucleus of a new and vital class. 

The smoke of Industry on Russia's horizon is her 
pillar of cloud by day. Her pillar of fire by night is 
that of the burning torches of progressive nations with 
which she has been forced into close fellowship by the 
war. 

The darkness of the Russian people will be further 
dispelled by the dynamics of borrowed dollars. The 
situation is simple. The Russian Government will 
need money after the war, and she will be obliged 
to borrow it from France and England unless she arbi- 
trarily wills to undo all the good that this war has done 
by again subjugating herself to Germany and German 
interests. Neither France nor England will be in a posi- 
tion to permit the strict reactionary interpretation so 
long as they are leagued with Russia against the Cen- 
tral Powers. Russia will have to come up to standard. 

This was the choice that the Russian Government 
faced until March, 1917. Then suddenly, almost 
over-night, plans that had been formulating for months 
were completed and the leaders of the people struck 
for freedom. It is too early to say what will come 
out of the chaos. The Romanov dynasty sees its end 
and the people are beholding the liberty they have 
been preparing for. 

The Russian people have reverted to a democracy. 



CHAPTER V 

"this is the faith of the fathers" 

REGARDING any church there are two points 
to note : spiritual facts and statistics. 
The statistics are all the more necessary in 
considering a state church such as Orthodoxy. In that 
circumstance the Church is an economic factor, an 
owner of lands, temporal power and moneys. It must 
be looked upon, then, as a corporation. 

The world boasts but one great international ec- 
clesiastical corporation, the Church of Rome, which 
is not restricted by the bounds of empire nor limited 
to any one tongue. The Orthodox Church of Russia 
and the Church of England are corporations subsidiary 
to their respective states, and, in the main, labor only 
in those countries where their tongues are spoken. They 
are national churches with national spheres of influence. 
Orthodox Russians, of course, do not speak of their 
Church as a State Church; it is called Gospodst- 
voyustchaya Tzerkov, the Predominating Church. 
This is only juggling with words, however, for, from 
every possible viewpoint, Orthodoxy is an arm of the 
Government. 

Orthodoxy became a corporation subsidiary to the 
Russian State during the reign of Peter the Great. 
Previous to that time it had existed as an offshoot of 
Byzantium. It has always been Byzantine in its forms. 

89 



90 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

The influence of the West came to Russia through the 
State ; the influence of the East has clung to it through 
the activities of the Church. It is the most persistently 
pro-Slav force in Russia, and consequently is one of 
the means by which the individuality of Russia will 
be preserved. 

Of the three ecclesiastical corporations, Orthodoxy 
possesses the greatest range of temporal power; the em- 
pire of the Orthodox Church is the Empire of Russia, 
which is one-sixth of the earth's land surface. Since it 
is not a missionary church, any activities outside the 
bounds of that empire can be interpreted only as a ful- 
filling of its legitimate stewardship, a shepherding of 
its flock in foreign parts. 

Because of this immense sphere of influence, and be- 
cause of its unyielding stand in matters of dogma, 
Orthodoxy lays claim to being the one church that will 
eventually lead the universe to salvation. As the 
antiphon in the liturgy runs, "This is the Faith of 
the Fathers. This is the Faith that will overcome the 
World." 



By the middle of the 17th Century the Church had 
developed a pronounced spirit of independence. Al- 
though it recognized the motherhood of Byzantium, 
the power of its prelates, growing with the power of 
the cities, emboldened the Church to make a stand for 
itself. It assumed the spiritual suzerainty of all Slav- 
dom. "The organic vice of the old Russian Church 
community," says Kluchevsky, 1 "lay in the fact that 

1 A History of Russia. By V. O. Kluchevsky. Vol. III. Page 307. 
New York, 19 11. 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 91 

it considered itself the one true Orthodox community 
in the world and its conception of the Deity the ex- 
clusive regular one; that it put forward as the creator 
of the universe a peculiarly Russian god, who belonged 
to and was known to no one else; and that it elevated 
to the ranks of the Church Universal a purely local 
church." 

To maintain such a position two conditions were 
necessary; a solidarity of belief and a uniformity of 
practice throughout the ecclesiastical empire. This 
state of affairs did not exist, however. Each section 
affected some variation in the rite; moreover, the 
ritual was anything but uniform throughout the 
Church. 

In 1666-7 Nikon, Patriarch of Moscow, then head 
of the Church, ordered the ritual standardized and 
completed plans for a translation of the Gospels into 
the vernacular. Both reforms met with immediate 
opposition. Local usage refused to be rooted out on 
order. Those who crossed themselves with three fin- 
gers were not willing to concede the ritual point to 
those who used two. As Nikon held authority, the 
bulk of Orthodoxy followed the new order, but there 
was an appreciable body that clung to the old. 

This break in the ranks of Orthodoxy was a schism 
rather than a heresy. In dogma the Raskolniks, or 
Old Believers, hold the same faith as the Orthodox and 
their churches are very much alike. They are also loyal 
and patriotic to the Empire, as witness many of the 
Cossacks who are Raskolniks. From the first they suf- 
fered persecution, for Orthodoxy has made every effort 
to drive these seceders into the fold and keep them 
there. In the past few years a movement for the con- 



92 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

solidation of the Old Believers with Orthodoxy has 
been gaining ground and may, after the war, bring 
about the devoutly wished-for unity in Russian Chris- 
tendom. 

Scarcely had the schism become permanent than 
Peter the Great came to the throne and in 1721 intro- 
duced another element into Orthodoxy by placing the 
administration of the Church on a basis that would 
prevent it from working contrary to the State. 
Hitherto the prestige and power of the Patriarch of 
Moscow had constantly caused friction with the throne. 
There was a two-fold monarchy — the Tsar and the 
Patriarch. Peter took the power from the Patriarch 
and entrusted it to an administrative council, the Holy 
Synod, at the head of which was the Tsar's representa- 
tive, a layman who held the position of chief pro- 
curator. This Synod has ever since been the directing 
force of religious affairs in Russia. 

The Synod consists to-day of the three metropolitans 
of Moscow, Petrograd and Kiev, the Archbishop of 
the Caucasus and several other bishops. The procura- 
tor, representing the Tsar, dictates what shall be the 
subjects discussed by the council, and in what ways it 
shall function. The appointments and depositions of 
bishops are in the hands of the Synod, who in turn 
appoint and remove the parish clergy and the abbots of 
monasteries. Thus is the administrative system linked 
with the Government and the lowest parish pope desig- 
nated as a representative of Russia's ecclesiastical em- 
pire. It, moreover, controls the disbursement of the 
income of the Church, which amounts to over $50,- 
000,000 annually. For the Church, in some ways, is 
richer than the State. 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 93 

II 

The Orthodox Church is an immensely wealthy cor- 
poration. In addition to the miles of land that it pos- 
sesses, its monasteries own lucrative estates in various 
parts of the Empire. The Church of England in the 
height of its monastic glory knew no such wealth as 
the Russian Church knows today. 

Unquestionably the time will come when the Church 
will have to make an accounting of its stewardship of 
all this material wealth. Whether it will come through 
force or by its own volition, it is difficult to say. Like 
the Government, the Church must eventually come up 
to standard, if it is to maintain its prestige with a 
people fast becoming enlightened. It is my private 
opinion that the Russian Church will not experience 
a sudden revolution either from the side of the Govern- 
ment or from the people. Apart from the reforms of 
Nikon it has never known any such break as the 
Reformation; in fact, the Reformation was scarcely 
heard of in Russia. A Protestant reform is out of the 
question. So for that matter is the disestablishment of 
the Church. The way it will come up to standard will 
probably be along gradual lines — evolution within its 
own ranks, the distribution of its lands among the peo- 
ple, and a more liberal interpretation of its doctrines. 

The Edict of Toleration (1905) showed the extent 
to which Orthodoxy's ranks were "papered," and gave 
an indication of what will happen once liberal religious 
views take root in the Russian soul. Although it will 
be a sad day for Russia's individuality as a nation, the 
time will unquestionably come when either the Church 
will be passed by on the other side, or will have ac- 



94 THE RUSSIANS : AN INTERPRETATION 

quired such new blood as to carry it on as the leader of 
the people. 

Reform is fast growing in the Church. One of the 
most significant movements of recent years is that tend- 
ing toward legislation which will permit a parish to 
elect its own pastor. At present the bishop of the 
diocese appoints the priest to the living and the parish- 
ioners have nothing to say in the matter. But there 
are hundreds of localities where the need for the right 
priest is felt and the desire to call a certain man to the 
locality is a live issue with the inhabitants. Under 
the existing regime the priest is, to all intents and pur- 
poses, a representative of the Ecclesiastical State. If 
he were chosen by the people, he would be their expres- 
sion of ecclesiastical self-government. 

In addition to this movement is one which also 
promises better things. There is a growing interest 
in sociological problems in the Russian villages. Here- 
tofore the interest has come from the intelligentia who 
went among the people ; now the people themselves are 
being quickened to an interest in the welfare of their 
fellows. Collective and individual philanthropy tend- 
ing toward the prevention of poverty and disease is 
becoming a part of the Church's interests in the small 
towns. The parish hall, for example, is no longer a 
great novelty. All this, of course, is part of that same 
movement for personal betterment which found expres- 
sion in the moupk's attitude toward the vodka traffic. 
The difference lies in the fact that the priests are here 
the leaders in the movement. A very vivid and pic- 
turesque account of this movement among the clergy 
is found in Potapenko's novel, "A Russian Priest," 
the tale of the effect of the humanitarian efforts of a 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 95 

young priest, Cyril Ignatievitch, in a secluded but 
priest-ridden parish. 

in 

To interpret the Church of the present time one must 
understand its labors and potentialities. The poten- 
tialities consist in a complete control, under the Gov- 
ernment, of all matters of dogma and practice. Its 
labors, apart from the administration of the sacra- 
ments and the upholding of the Christian faith, are 
along three lines, viz.: political activities, education 
and the Christianizing of the frontiers of the Empire. 

The political activities of the Church may be denned 
as an effort to hedge itself with such bureaucratic sup- 
port as to resist and ward off attack against its tem- 
poral power. Yet there are hosts of priests and prelates 
in Russia to-day who serve their consciences better than 
they serve their king. There has often been open sym- 
pathy with the people, and more than one priest has 
been unfrocked and exiled for his liberal views. 

At the last counting, 83.4% of the total scholastic 
body in Russia attended the primary schools which, 
for the most part, are controlled and conducted by the 
Church. The curriculum consists of the three R's, do- 
mestic science for the girls and the rudiments of bee- 
keeping and farming for the boys, together with gener- 
ous doses of religious instruction. 

This control of primary education has logical rea- 
sons. Both Orthodoxy and the Roman Church hold 
that the foundations of faith must be laid in childhood 
if a man is expected to turn to it in his times of need 
and at death. Hence the insistence of both churches 
on the religious instruction of the young. The impos- 



96 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

sibility of enforcing it, on the other hand, is one of 
the vital weaknesses of Protestantism. Eclectic re- 
ligion does not "stand up" under great crises or dis- 
tress. Moreover, if the Church is to endure, it must 
constantly be training the new race of believers. The 
strength of Catholicism both East and West lies in 
the future generation. 

In the curricula of the higher schools the Church 
has often exercised the most arbitrary and senseless 
authority, dimming the light of truth with the shadow 
of prejudice. Professors and instructors who are in- 
clined to disseminate irreligious or heretical ideas are 
closely watched and summarily punished. 

The activities of the Church in education, then, are 
to train the coming generations of believers and to 
safeguard the faith as taught to the people today. 
There is still a third activity — the labors on the fron- 
tiers of Orthodoxy. 

IV 

A ribbon of land, in some regions fifty miles wide, 
in others fifty yards, threads its way from the Pacific, 
above the shoulder of the Hermit Kingdom, and across 
the backbone of Manchuria. On the fringe of the Gobi 
Desert, between the Mongol and Russian vis-a-vis, 
Maimatchin and Kiakhta, it narrows to a brook bed. 
Widening, it twists thence in and out the passes of 
the Altai, and, by a circuitous southern course over 
sun-parched steppe and forested mountain face, finally 
reaches the Caspian, Russia's Asiatic border. 

You will see a varied lot of frontiers if you travel 
extensively, but rarely will you find a border that 
voices so forcibly the methods and ideals of a nation 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 97 

as does that strip marking the edge of Muscovite lord- 
ship. Studded along it, like buttons on a lambrequin, 
stand little stockaded forts, each with its equipment of 
men and arms. From them, by day and by night, 
tramp stern-visaged men to patrol the intervening 
stretches. By day and by night their eyes are fixed 
on the southern horizon — Mongolia, Tibet, Afghanis- 
tan and Indiaward. Mounted and afoot, armed for 
action and alarm, they form a veritable picket fence 
of bayonets from the Pacific to the Caspian. 

These soldiers who defend the farther fringe of the 
Tsar's kingdom constitute only the skirmishing line of 
a greater army. Behind the soldiers stand the priests. 

Until you have seen this second army you cannot 
comprehend the first. Until you are convinced that 
Russia has assimilated and is assimilating more and 
more territory that she may bring "His saving faith," 
as she understands it, to all nations, you will not fully 
grasp the raison d'etre of Russian arms. "The world 
policy of Russia is a gradual growth. It is the Chris- 
tian ideal. The expulsion of the Turk, the conversion 
of the Asiatic heathen, world-wide dominion of Rus- 
sian Orthodoxy, are nothing more than the realization 
of Christ's Kingdom on earth." Incredulous students 
of international politics may claim that the Slavophils 
— Alexander III, Dostoevsky and their kind — are all 
dead, their dream an illusion forever shattered. The 
reigning Tsar, however, adheres to the ideals his father 
set up, as many of his administrative acts prove, and 
as is indicated by the continent-cleaving Asiatic border 
to-day. 

Beneath the surface of the main channel of Russian 
endeavor to-day is rolling, silently, with irresistible, 



98 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

impelling force, the Slavophil spirit. Russians look to 
Constantinople and the day when the Cross will shine 
out above St. Sophia. It is to-day the dream of the 
wise men at Petrograd, it is the dream of the obscure 
village priest that, through the Orthodox Faith, the 
world will be converted to Christ. And these doubters 
of the Filioque have set before themselves, as a means 
to attaining that end, the absorption of territory in 
Asia until the borders of the Russian Empire shall be 
contiguous to those of a Christian-civilizing power, 
British India. 

In the '90's, when Manchuria became a complement 
of Eastern Siberia by the building of a railroad, an 
army was flung across it, ostensibly to guard the line 
from the depredations of native brigands. But 
scarcely had these soldiers become settled in their 
bastioned forts (you can still see them to-day) than the 
fiat went forth that missionaries of faiths other than 
the Orthodox would be excluded from Manchuria. 
And into Manchuria poured the Russian priests — Mos- 
covy's second line of the Church Militant. 

It is obvious that Russia is determined not to step 
aside from the path to her "clear-purposed goal" — so 
forcibly symbolized by her troop-lined, priest-guarded 
Asiatic border — of dispelling national and racial diver- 
gencies through the erection above them of the Cross 
of Orthodoxy. The war may have put the movement 
in abeyance, but the desire is there and the dream is 
still cherished in the hearts of the believers. 

But have these frontiersmen of Orthodoxy accom- 
plished their purpose 1 ? The answer is found in Man- 
churia to-day. 

At Port Arthur, shortly after Russia leased that sec- 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 99 

tion, were laid the foundations for a mighty church. 
Men and machines dragged iron-stone monoliths and 
set them up on the hillside. Eighty thousand roubles 
($40,000) were sunk in the foundations alone. A 
fortress of the faith, as inaccessible as was Tiger's Tail 
on the heights above, was to be this church. Slowly 
from the forest of scaffolding reared the walls. 

Then came war and the defeat of Kuropatkin on the 
Yalu. Down the peninsula streamed the Japanese 
army. Behind Tiger's Tail cowered the Russian fleet, 
while Togo lay without. The siege guns began to 
belch, and into that quiet pocket of the Asiatic coast- 
line was hurled the awful thunder of war. For eleven 
months Japanese shells battered against the founda- 
tions of the new church, showers of bullets snipped the 
scaffolding, huge projectiles pierced the walls and nosed 
their way into the pavement where the altar was to 
stand. 

On January 2nd, 1905, Stoessel handed his sword 
to Nogi; ten days later the twenty-six thousand Rus- 
sian soldiers, stripped of arms, marched out from the 
fortress. In their midst walked the soldiers of Rus- 
sia's second army, these carrying the accoutrements of 
their warfare — the sacred vessels, the ikons, the books 
of the liturgy. 

Today all that remains of what was to have been 
the church are some crumbling ruins. The little slant- 
eyed Japanese guide, who points them out, says with 
pride, "No use now, there is only one Russian left in 
Port Arthur." 

To the eastward, thirty miles over the hills, lies 
Darien. "Dalny" the Russians called it, and they had 
great plans for making the little Chinese port a mighty 



ioo THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

commercial capital in the Far East. Broad streets were 
laid out, and a civic center planned, rows of substantial 
houses ran up, the harbor was dredged and wharves 
constructed. As the crowning glory, a big cathedral 
was erected on an eminence in the heart of town. Then 
came the war. With scarcely the interchange of a shot, 
Dalny fell into the hands of the Japanese. 

The dawn of 1905 brought the Russian dream for 
the town to a bitter awakening. The Japanese poured 
in and took up the life of the city. Today Darien is 
booming, with trolley cars and a newspaper in English, 
with office buildings and an electric park, fashioned 
after the manner of Coney Island, which looks out over 
the sapphire waters of the bay. On all sides buildings 
are springing up. Each boat from Japan brings a fresh 
consignment of settlers. Few Russians remain — a 
handful of merchants, a score of clerks and the consul, 
who lives in the ugly white house to the north of the 
town. 

Central in this bustle and growth stands the Rus- 
sian cathedral. What were once its close-clipped lawns 
are now waist-high meadows of rank weeds. Far over- 
head the stay cables of the dome cross, rusted and 
snapped, swing languidly in the gentle breeze that 
blows in from the Pacific. Attempt to enter the 
grounds, and you find the gates chained. Huge pad- 
locks are on each door. . . . Across the street stands 
the Yamato Hotel, one of those smart, up-to-date 
Japanese hostelries. In its parlor each Sunday morn- 
ing an Anglican pastor gathers about him the resident 
Britons and prays that laborers be sent forth into the 
harvest. 

Two hundred miles north of Darien threads the rib- 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 101 

bon of land that so strikingly defines the southern 
fringe of Russian lordship in Manchuria. There stand 
her soldiers. There stand her priests. Though the 
Treaty of Portsmouth made no such provision, Russia 
withdrew her spiritual forces just so soon as her sol- 
diers were defeated. 

In a word, Russia's spiritual conquests abroad de- 
pend on her victories on the field of battle. 



Until one has entered a Russian church he can have 
no conception of the profound piety of the Russian 
people. Nor, for that matter, can he imagine the rich- 
ness of the glory of her churches and the meaning 
which that richness symbolizes. 

Here the walls without and within are frescoed in 
all manner of brilliant colors. There is nothing somber 
about the buildings, like the little tin Bethels in which 
one is often obliged to worship in other lands more ap- 
parently enlightened. The municipality, the Synod or 
the Zemstvo will erect the building, but the free-will 
offerings of the people make it a palace — even the hum- 
blest of village churches. To the very roof beams the 
walls are covered with ikons (flat religious paintings, 
since the carved figure is forbidden by Orthodoxy as 
tending toward the graven image), many of them en- 
crusted with jewels. Lamps and candles burn before 
the ikons, the shrines and altar during service. At the 
farther end of the church — which is always the eastern 
end — is a great screen or ikonostas, on which are other 
ikons. Before it hang lamps perpetually burning. 
Double doors, or the Royal Gates, are in the middle 



102 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

and give entrance to the altar. Behind this screen the 
priest retires to celebrate the most sacred parts of the 
Divine Mysteries. 1 

In the air is the dry odor of stale incense, the acrid 
tinge of gutted candles mixed with the sweat of muddy 
boots and muddier humanity — the indescribable 
miasma of mob religion. 

There is a singular democracy about the services. 
Rich and poor, high and lowly rub elbows, paupers, 
princes, gentlemen, saints, fools, demi-mondes, soldiers, 
intelligentia, merchants, old folks and young, men in 

1 Strictly speaking, the Orthodox church is divided into three parts: 
(i) The sanctuary, into which none but the clergy enter. (2) The 
nave, reserved for the congregation. (3) The porch, which in the 
ancient church was occupied by catechumens and penitents, but now 
is generally occupied by a table in charge of a nun where tapers and 
ikons can be purchased. 

The ikonostas separates the sanctuary from the nave. Three doors 
pierce it, two of them constituting the Royal Gates mentioned above. 
In the middle of the sanctuary stands the altar vested in linen and 
rich brocade and bearing the ciborium, which contains the Reserved 
Sacrament, the gospels and a cross. On the wall behind is a painting 
of the crucifixion with a seven-branch candlestick before it, which 
is lighted during service. At the celebration of the Divine Mysteries, 
a small cloth called the antimins is spread on the altar and the sacred 
vessels placed upon it covered with a veil. 

The north side of the sanctuary is known as the Chapel of the 
Prothesis. There stands the table of oblations, upon which the sacred 
vessels are prepared for Mass. The south side of the sanctuary is 
the vestry. The floor of the sanctuary is raised above the level 
of the nave. That part of the platform immediately before the 
ikonostas is called the solea and is occupied by the choir; in the 
middle, or ambo, stands the deacon when he reads the Gospel. 

During the service the priest and deacon wear tunicles over their 
street cassocks and put maniples upon their wrists. The priest then 
places about his neck the epitrachelion or stole, and over that a cope 
called the pheloneon. The deacon wears an orarion or scarf on his 
left shoulder, letting it hang down on both sides save during the 
reading of the suffrages, when he holds it in his fingers, and during 
the Mass, when he binds it about his shoulders in the form of a cross. 

The sacrament is concentrated in leavened bread — a point of de- 
parture from the Roman and Anglican Churches, and the wine and 
water are mixed in the chalice at the Table of Oblations, and not 
at the altar, a second point of departure. The gates of the ikonostas 
are closed during the consecration and the fracture of the Host. 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 103 

rude sheepskin kaftans and men in the brilliant decora- 
tions of a dozen campaigns. On one side stand the 
women, on the other stand the men. There are no 
padded pews to sink into. Orthodoxy is not a com- 
fortable religion. You stand up during the services or 
kneel — which is in accordance with the decree of the 
First Ecumenical Council of Nicea — and prostrate 
yourself when the time for prostration comes — pro- 
found prostration to the very floor, even though you are 
decrepit or obese. I have seen crippled men and women 
who could scarcely drag themselves up the church steps, 
but who were able to perform the most profound rever- 
ences when once they entered the doors. How they 
did it I cannot say. Russian knees may be more lim- 
ber than ours. They have been using them for kneel- 
ing for many generations. Perhaps, like the amazing 
democracy of the service itself, it is one of those inde- 
finable spiritual facts of Russia. 

As is generally known, the music of the services is 
unaccompanied. Male voices alone lead the singing. 
There is also absent the concert atmosphere one gets in 
some of our aristocratic churches of America. Congre- 
gational singing has always been the practice of Ortho- 
doxy. The service is a service of the people, and save 
for the few moments when he is behind the ikonostas 
for the consecration in the Mass, the priest is always 
in the midst of his people, the shepherd of his flock. 

Confessions are made right in the open church in the 
sight of the entire congregation, not in the comfortable 
security of a confessional box. Truly, it is a religion 
of the people, for the people and most distinctly by 
the people. 

During the last few years there has been a growth 



104 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

in the art of preaching in Russian churches. Whereas 
before sermons were scarcely heard, they are now being 
preached in a majority of the churches. This public 
desire for homilies — for the practice arose through con- 
gregational requests for sermons — will unquestionably 
result in the better education of the clergy as a whole. 



VI 

The clergy in Russia are divided into two bodies, 
the black or monastic, and the white or parish popes. 
Between the two is drawn a deep line of demarcation. 
The former comprise the executive and scholastic body 
of the priesthood. They live in monasteries which 
are endowed by the State, and although they are dedi- 
cated to the rigorous life of the counsels, they have not 
to face the problems of food and drink, shelter and 
raiment. To say that they lead an indolent life would 
be libel. They are the cells in which is stored the 
kinetic spiritual energy of the Orthodox Church. 
Among them have been and are many humble saints 
and great workers of miracles, mystics and ascetics, 
whose quiescent energy has strengthened the pulse of 
believers throughout the Empire. Their material pros- 
pects, on the whole, are that of the religious in 
Catholicism, except that they enjoy the possibility of 
being elevated to a bishopric, since it is from the black 
clergy alone that bishops are chosen. 

The white clergy, on the other hand, are the direct 
contact machines through which the Orthodox Church 
administers its sacraments, spreads its teaching to the 
masses and wards off the attacks of foes. For them 
marriage is obligatory, and although they receive a 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 105 

small stipend from the State, the problems of a living, 
the demands of a wife and children and the support 
of a home are ever present. 

Since the executive power, the Holy Synod, is com- 
posed in the main of black clergy, it is the black clergy 
that have precedence in the eyes of the Church. The 
feeling between the two orders has long since passed 
the bounds of good-natured competition. It now re- 
solves itself into bitter enmity, with the religious 
ranked higher than the seculars, and the seculars much 
in the position of the proverbial underdog. The ques- 
tions that confront them in their dealings with one 
another are not how much opportunity for Christian 
labor shall the white clergy have and how much the 
black, but how much of the ecclesiastical budget can 
the one take without making the breach between the 
two still wider. 

The lot of the white clergy is also rendered difficult 
by the fact that they are, to an extent, servants of the 
State. Thus, since Orthodoxy is the State religion, 
the Orthodox village pope is ostensibly charged with 
the supervision of the local activities and private life 
of his congregation. He is supposed to allay uneasi- 
ness, nip in the bud any revolutionary tendencies that 
may be brought to his notice, and, in some sections, 
he has even been known to be a member of the dreaded 
Third Division with the sad duty of having to report 
to the police the politically recalcitrant of his village. 
Since the alarming spread of dissent that followed on 
the ukase for religious freedom a few years back, the 
village priest has been considered not so much the shep- 
herd of his flock, the guide in morals, the consoler in 
grief and the counselor in doubt, as an untiring sup- 



106 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

pressor of heterodoxy, an ecclesiastical militant of the 
most violent order, a persecutor of the sectarian. 

In addition, he has a function that in other countries 
has long since devolved upon the secular authorities. 
As a civil marriage does not exist in Russia, the contract 
being held valid only when consecrated by the Church 
and registered in the Church books, the -pope is the 
authority in the local bureau of vital statistics. He 
is the registrar of births and marriages and deaths in 
Russia. 

For filling this dual role of priest and state servant, 
the Government, as has been said, sees that he is given 
a stipend. The budget of the Holy Synod for the 
year 1915 showed the following item: "For town 
and country clergy, for missions and missionaries, 
14,800,715 roubles." Seven million four hundred 
thousand dollars seems a large sum, yet, if it were 
divided equally between the rural clergy and the mis- 
sionaries, the village priest's share would not exceed 
$50 a year. As matters stand a huge part of that ap- 
propriation is spent for missions, the remaining sums 
being apportioned in the following manner: To the 
rector of an influential parish in a large town, 144 
roubles, $72 per annum; in a medium-sized parish, 108 
roubles, $54; and to the smaller ones, 72 roubles, $36. 

This sliding scale of stipends demonstrates the rea- 
son for the average priest's paradoxical position in the 
eyes of the Government. Though an indirect servant 
of the State, he cannot be granted a wage that will 
permit him to exceed in social appearance and posi- 
tion the local direct representatives of the Government, 
the captain of gendarmes and the ispravnik, the district 
chief of police. The Government knows well that the 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 107 

moujik is swayed by ocular proof, hence the ecclesias- 
tical must never rank above the civil. Here Church 
and State are at loggerheads, with the poor white clergy 
once more the underdog. 

Beside his position in the Church and in the State 
is his position in society. Frankly, he has none. The 
fact of a man's being of the white clergy works the op- 
posite effect that it does here in America or in Britain, 
where the parish clergyman is given entree because of 
his cloth. The nobility in Russia look down on the 
village popes, and in the country districts the landed 
proprietors generally hold them lightly, except when 
they can be used to advantage to further their own 
ends. 

This attitude has been brought about by the ancient 
caste system that used to obtain among the clergy, and 
by their lack of education. Until the end of the last 
century it was the unwritten but understood rule that 
no pope's son could enter a profession. The body 
ecclesiastical became a thing apart. Moreover, there 
were ranks in the white clergy that no one dared trans- 
gress. No son could hold an office higher than his 
father held — a pope's son had to become a pope, and 
a vicar's a vicar. The office was hereditary, and in 
some villages the pope's family held the living for 
generations. This system of castes has been dissolved 
by permitting popes' sons to enter the services of the 
State, with the result that now on university staffs and 
in regimental messes can be found innumerable sons 
of the rural clergy. 

Time was when the educational requirements for the 
pope were absurdly insignificant. The knowledge of 
how to read and write and the learning of a few psalms 



108 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

by heart was about all that his examiners required of 
him. This condition, too, has changed, and now the 
level of education among the village clergy is much 
higher, and is being raised every year. 

Public opinion formed through the ages does not 
change so quickly, however, and for some time to come 
the village pope must suffer the slights from society 
that he once deserved because of his professional restric- 
tions and his ignorance. 

The factor weighing heaviest in the balance of the 
pope's private life is the obligatory marriage. In the 
few weeks intervening between his graduation and his 
appointment to a living he must find a wife. She is 
invariably chosen from among the daughters of the 
clergy. As the bishop is ex officio guardian to all 
priests' children, he generally has a list of marriageable 
girls on hand to offer the young candidate. Perhaps 
the seminarist may never have seen the girl, perhaps 
he may be in love with another, yet he finds it politic 
to humor the bishop's whim and marry the girl chosen. 

The girl's side of the problem is even more difficult. 
She is obliged to bring to her fiance a dowry — a sum 
of money, wool and silk clothes, tea and table service 
and furniture. How the poor village priest manages 
to scrape together such an expensive dot, no one knows. 

So in this way it has come about that a pope marries 
a pope's daughter. Should the young priest die, the 
support of the children devolves upon the bishop. 
Should they be very young, they are sent off to a home. 
If one of the children is a girl not yet of marriageable 
age, the bishop permits her to live on with her mother 
until she is old enough to marry a graduating semi- 
narist. The living meanwhile may be left vacant. 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" 109 

The young priest who has to marry under these cir- 
cumstances is to be pitied ; he has not alone poverty to 
face and a round of exacting duties, but he must live 
with his mother-in-law ! 

From the foregoing it must not be thought that 
happy marriages among the clergy are rare. In fact, 
most of them are happily married and their home life 
is the one bright spot in the village. 

Having acquired his wife and his appointment, the 
young priest settles down in his living. The church 
has been erected by the town, so that in most cases 
the new pastor has little of the material fabric of the 
church to worry about. It is to the moujiks that he 
must look for his home. According to the custom, this 
is provided by the congregation ; and since it is a costly 
item, the new incumbent finds it difficult at times to 
persuade his people to furnish him with a fit dwelling 
place. Once the wife, the living, and the house prob- 
lems are settled, what prospect lies before the young 
priest 1 ? 

In the ecclesiastical realm there are the church serv- 
ices, with perhaps a chapel or two to attend. He must 
tramp or ride this circuit, reading services, attending 
to the spiritual wants of his flock. If there is a school 
in the village, he takes a class in religious instruction; 
if there is no school, the children come to his house. 
This house, in addition, must always be ready for the 
welcoming of officials, of visitors and of strangers who 
may not care to put up at the village inn. 

The pope's material prospects are dependent on the 
charity of his people and the bounty of the crops, to- 
gether with the $38 he received from the State. In 
his circuit of the parish he generally collects fees in 



no THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

kind — a measure of meal, a piece of handmade linen, 
a loaf of bread, a bunch of radishes. Often, however, 
the sodden peasant would simply set out the vodka 
bottle and tell the pastor to help himself. Before the 
war the pastor did help himself — with lamentable re- 
sults. 

The drunkenness of the village clergy is a pet theme 
of anti-Russian polemicists. It is true that drink at 
one time had such a hold on the poorer white clergy 
that the Holy Synod was obliged to include in the 
questions on a pope's service list: "To what extent 
does he indulge in intoxicating liquors?" It was also 
true that the habit was forced upon him by circum- 
stances. He hate,d vodka, he knew its damnable re- 
sults — but what could he do % He preached against it, 
but at the danger of cutting off his own bread and but- 
ter. Fortunate for him has been this vodka prohibi- 
tion! 

What the moujik thinks of his pastor depends, of 
course, on both the moujik and the pastor, and it may 
be said in justice to both that the priest is held in high 
regard. The thinking peasant has very clear ideas of 
what constitutes ethical goodness and what elements 
go to make up a leader of men. "The type of saint 
as conceived by our peasant," says Uspensky, "is not 
that of an anchorite timidly secluded from the world 
lest some part of the treasure he is accumulating in 
Heaven might get damaged. Our popular saint is the 
man of the ikfzr, a man of practical piety, a teacher and 
a benefactor of the people." 

The picture above may seem very dark, but there are 
bright sides to the lowly priest's life and many a com- 
pensation. There are years of abundant harvest; there 



"THE FAITH OF THE FATHERS" m 

are the love and care of wife and children; there are 
faithful folk and true in the congregation; there are 
humble saints among those shaggy, obstinate moujiks 
that must bring cheer to his heart. 

There is a divine compensation that comes to these 
humble workers in Orthodoxy's spiritual fields. It is 
not merely the silver lining in the priest's dark cloud 
when he dreams of promotion ; it is a subtler and more 
potent urge that is vouchsafed him. It is the true elan 
vital that makes of the humblest, most despised cleric 
a superman of the Levites, a priest after the order of 
Melchisedec. The world can deny him enough food 
and drink, but it cannot take from him the indwelling 
of the Holy Spirit. The wrangles of Church and State 
and the neglect of his congregation may make his house 
a mean place, but in no measure can it deprive him of 
the divine grace that makes his heart its home. 

It is when the pope is before the altar that the com- 
pensation comes. Like a contact point on an electric 
machine that sparks and flames as the power surges 
through it, he stands with hands uplifted that reach 
Heaven. At that moment he is elevated to divine 
estate. The golden vestments on him, the gold about 
on all sides, the enclouding incense and the glory of a 
hundred lighted tapers lift him up to realms above 
poverty and loneliness and scorn. 

Shaggy-bearded, shaggy-locked, burdened with a 
hundred responsibilities — on the shoulders of these vil- 
lage priests the strength of Orthodoxy is laid. Some 
day the State may slip its support from beneath the 
Church; but in that hour Orthodoxy will stand firm 
because of these humble village priests. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 

THE war has driven the world home to the 
foot of the Cross. 
Of recent years we have concerned our- 
selves with living, with creating religions of living 
happily. We have had our philosophy strongly col- 
ored by the Pollyanna spirit. Suffering was denied, 
sorrow was scorned, death defied. We were so en- 
grossed in teaching men how to live happily that we 
completely neglected to teach them how to die happily. 

Suddenly this fool's paradise is plunged into war. 
Rank on rank of men fall before the murderous fire. 
By thousands they die on blood-washed fields, in hos- 
pitals, on the seas. Famine and want and disease 
scourge the land. The weight of suffering is thrown 
on the shoulders of the world. 

Hitherto we have been saying that these things were 
not possible. Now we know that they are not only 
very possible but very true. Hitherto we have looked 
on death with bland unconcern. Now we consider it 
an atonement, whereby men may wash out the evil of 
their lives, a triumph, the least of the sacrifices men 
can make for an ideal. 

We have valued life too much and death too little. 
Now must we learn the grim necessity of teaching men 
how to die. 

112 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 113 

The nearer one approaches the East, the less he finds 
life valued, and the more is death appreciated. In 
Russia, that mingled country of the East and West, 
Life is only a path to the gateway of Death. Russia 
has always understood suffering and been acquainted 
with grief. The moujik's Christ was a cripple; you 
can see His crutch in the third crooked arm of the Rus- 
sian cross. The moujik holds that if you would fol- 
low in His footsteps, you must bear His cross in the 
podvig, the suffering that atones. As the poem runs 
at the bottom of a Russian war picture, 

The podvig is in battle, 
The podvig is in struggle, 
The highest podvig is in patience, 
Love and prayer. 1 

So then, when the spear of war pierces the moujik's 
side, he understands it as few men can. To him the 
foot of the Cross is his eventual home. The way there 
lies through the lights and shadows of his motley re- 
ligion. 



Beside my inkpot lies a small bronze Maltese cross. 
On one face is stamped a wheel, a pair of wings and 
some cryptic capitals; on the reverse, the name of a 
bicycle maker of Miami, Ohio. This cross was cut 
from the neck of a Russian soldier who died in the 
trenches. 

How such an advertising bauble got from Miami, 
Ohio, to shell-scarred No Man's Land, I cannot say. 

*I have availed myself of this translation from an article by 
Stephen Graham in Country Life for October 14th, 1916. 



114 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

A fictioner might weave a romance about it. All I 
know is that he was a shaggy-haired youth, a peasant, 
and that the cross was upon him. 

Frankly, the fact of his being a youth detracts some- 
what from the reality the presence of the cross might 
have had. Had he been a man of middle age or one 
approaching old age, I should feel differently about it, 
because he would have felt differently about it. To 
such a man the cross would have meant something very 
vital in his everyday life, for by that time he would 
have begun his pilgrimage. 

Every Russian child, at baptism, has a cross or an 
ikon placed about his neck, and there it remains until 
J death. Yet for the first half of life the symbol repre- 
sents scarcely anything to him other than the meaning 
which sentiment attaches. 

Like youths the world over, his head is too full of 
play for churchly and religious things. When he en- 
ters manhood there are the stern problems of wrench- 
ing a meager fare from the soil, problems that grow 
heavier as the years and family increase. Moreover, 
the peasant has neither the leisure nor the habit of mind 
to fit him for abstract speculation. For a number of 
years, then, he leads a life in which religion is quite the 
least important element. 

By this it must not be supposed that the outward 
signs of devoutness are absent or that fervor is at all 
lacking. The young moujik's piety leaves much to be 
desired; yet, if you were to judge him by external 
things — by the reverence with which he mentions the 
Sacred Name or the ostentatious manner of his worship 
in church — you would set the peasant lad down as the 
most fervid devotee. 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 115 

Russian students are divided on this question of 
the reality or non-reality of the peasant's religion. The 
Slavophils and the disciples of Tolstoy make him a 
romantically sacrosanct figure; the opposite school, of 
whom the most prominent representative is the his- 
torian N. Kostomiarov, claims that the modern Ortho- 
dox peasants are at much the same pass to-day as were 
their forefathers, the Muscovites, of the 17th Century, 
who were "remarkable for a state of such complete re- 
ligious indifference as to be without parallel in the 
annals of Christian nations." 

The difficulty in accepting wholly either one of these 
opinions is that neither is applicable to the entirety of 
the peasant's life. In youth and manhood he is a 
loose-end soul. In old age, he is quite another person. 
Should you chance to speak to a village pope on the 
lax morals of his young men, he will shrug a shoulder 
and utter that characteristic "Nzeckevo" — What does 
it matter 1 ? Knowing the Russian soul, he rests assured 
that when age comes on, these Godless sons will turn 
to the church for strength and consolation. 

Thus, up to a certain point in life, the peasant's 
mind is set not on things above, but on the bread and 
butter, or, more precisely, the bread and vodka side 
of life. Then of a sudden, stirred by repentance, by 
illness, by bereavement, by loneliness, or more com- 
monly by the quickening of the quiescent fervor that 
is in the blood of every Slav, he looks beyond mundane 
things and centers his religion on the farther side of 
the grave. Work and play and drink alike become 
abominations to him. A restlessness creeps over his 
spirit. He wants to be on his way. The desire to 
"go to Jerusalem" leaps like a flame before him. By 



n6 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

the very act of wishing to go, he believes he has al- 
ready begun the journey. 

The phenomenon of the pilgrimage can be witnessed 
in Russia as nowhere else to-day. Along the city 
streets, down country roads, across the desolate steppes, 
you meet the pilgrims in ones, in twos, in threes, some- 
times in hosts. They are invariably gray-haired. 
Many are crippled. Neither poverty nor physical 
weakness, however, seems to resist the divine poten- 
tialities that this desire arouses in them. They may 
be journeying to Moscow, to Mt. Athos, to Kiev, or 
even to Jerusalem itself. Whatever the destination, 
the pilgrimage is the crowning act of the peasant's 
faith, just as the center of that faith is on the other 
side of the grave. 

To the thousands that actually do go on pilgrimages, 
there are tens of thousands who are pilgrimaging, 
though they never leave their dooryards. Often in 
traveling through the country you will put up at a 
peasant's hut and be told, somewhat to your embar- 
rassment, that the grandfather of the household is very 
ill. He lies on a heap of dirty bed-linen off in one 
corner, and no one pays much attention to him. In- 
vestigation will prove him, like as not, to be a per- 
fectly healthy specimen of rugged old age with actually 
nothing the matter with him. Try as you may, no 
amount of persuasion or threats will rouse the old fel- 
low from his bed. And that, it seems, is the way with 
the Russian peasant. When he falls sick he knows 
beyond the shadow of a doubt he is going to die. Per- 
haps he may recover, but the lesson has been too real 
to him ; and while his body is simply taking a rest cure, 
his spirit has turned its back upon this world and set 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 117 

its feet upon the road that leads up to the Spiritual 
City. Henceforth he will do no work save to prepare 
for death. 

Dying prepared is the one thing that the moujik 
has reduced, if I might use the parlance of the day, 
to a fine art. He has a wholesome fear of dying sud- 
denly, lest he be without absolution. He has a whole- 
some fear of dying without material preparations lest 
he be buried in the shroud intended for another. So 
soon as he thinks he is going to die, he sets about mak- 
ing his shroud. It is sewed of a number of pieces 
of linen cut in a certain fashion. A wooden cross for 
the neck is carved, and that and the shroud are bun- 
dled together. Should the peasant go on a pilgrimage, 
he takes these with him. 

When he dies, women prepare his body for burial, 
dressing it in the shroud and placing the wooden cross 
about the neck. Candles are set around the coffin, and 
in their light nuns of the neighborhood read the Psalms 
until the time for interment. Then the church sends 
a richly embroidered pall to put over the coffin, for 
though it is nowhere written in the rubrics, the peasants 
believe that at death each man becomes a priest. 

Thus far, with few exceptions, the faith of the 
moujik may appear to differ but little from faith 
the world over. The idea of death rarely appeals to a 
youth, and the average man, busy with his duties, has 
little time to think upon it. One usually associates 
thoughts of death with old age. 

The point wherein the moujik differs from every 
other peasant is the fact that this peculiar attraction 
of death is the foundation and superstructure and cap- 
stone of his faith. Speak to him of the pre-crucifixion 



n8 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

life of the Lord, and he is not interested. The teach- 
ings, the parables, the miracles, the daily life of the 
Master as He moved among men, as He journeyed 
from place to place with His disciples — these things the 
peasant cares little for. But once you begin to talk 
of those few days following the Resurrection, those 
appearances and disappearances, those words whis- 
pered here and there upon the road by the Stranger — 
then the Russian peasant begins to take interest. He 
cannot understand the radiant human face of Christ, 
but he can understand the pale face of the dead Christ 
in Mary's lap. The same is true of his attitude toward 
the saints. With few exceptions, a dead saint attracts 
him far more than a live one. 

Should you judge the faith of the moujik in the 
terms of the West, you find yourself utterly at sea. 
We view life through the eyes of life, the Russian 
views life through the eyes of death. To him "Life 
is the night, Death the rising of the sun." 

There are several reasons to which might be at- 
tributed the moujik's uncanny feeling about death. It 
might be explained by analyzing his dual nature : the 
element of the East with all its detachment from life 
and its leaning toward a purely mystical conception 
of the world; and the Aryan element of the West, 
which centers its religion in life, which loves the flesh, 
which believes in the reality of the world with all 
its victories over the forces of Nature and its dreams 
of evolution, progress, and development. The West 
teaches the intense joyousness of Life; the East the 
joyousness of Death. 

Moreover, the peasant has a tendency toward ex- 
tremes. He is as impatient and impetuous as a child. 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 119 

He cannot grasp the infinite patience and endless la- 
bors by which a race of serfs rises to a high plane 
of civilization. He does not understand evolu- 
tion. Under his skin he is an extremist, a revolution- 
ist. When he petitions his government, he demands 
the seizure and equal distribution of all State lands 
and private properties; when he drinks, he gets drunk; 
when he eats, he gorges; when he believes the end of 
life to be approaching, he cannot go on with the day's 
toil and meet death while he labors, but he must begin 
to die from the moment the thought of death occurs 
to him. And with all the mystic, somber and obscure 
fervor of the East, he sets about making his shroud 
and carving his cross and stumbling on his pilgrimage. 
In addition to these two — the feeling of the East 
toward death and the tendency toward extremes — 
there is still a third reason why death means a joyous 
thing to the moujik. He is in reality glad to die, be- 
cause it has been so very hard to live. Little wonder 
that the Christ of the wounded hands and feet should 
have such an appeal to the peasant whose hands and 
feet also have been wounded ! Little wonder that for 
him Death is the gateway to Life ! 

11 

All dead saints to the moujik are very much alive. 
And behind this is a story other than the explanation 
of his interest in death. 

We of the West look upon a religious object as a 
symbol ; what reverence we pay it, we pay to the thing 
the symbol represents. With the Russian peasant this 
is quite different. His ikons and saints and ceremonies 



120 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

lose their signification as means to an end and become, 
as in the East, idols and ends in themselves. "In 
the eyes of the people," says Stepniak, "the ikon is a 
living thing; the very body of the saint, whose spirit 
dwells in it as a man's spirit inhabits his corporeal 
frame. They believe that the ikon feels pain and pleas- 
ure, resents insults, and is gratified by kind treatment, 
just as a living being would be." 

These assertions, no doubt, will meet with denials 
from those who know the dogmatic side alone of the 
Orthodox Church. However, after being with the 
peasant in European Russia, traveling with him on 
his emigrant train to Siberia, and living elbow to el- 
bow with him in far-away villages of the Russian East, 
the consensus of my observations is that, at heart, his 
religion is idolatrous and pagan when viewed according 
to strict Western standards. 

To consider the Byzantine form of Christianity, as 
found to-day in Russia, apart from its distinctly East- 
ern and pagan elements, were mere folly. The advan- 
tage of its theology is that it is elastic enough to cover 
all states and elements of faith. The Orthodox Church 
still works side by side with pagan rites that once con- 
stituted the body of the primitive Slav religion. It 
has gathered up many of the old ways, to be sure, but 
vestiges of others exist. In the church itself the bewil- 
dering color of both architecture and ceremonial, the 
secretive nature lent the Mass by the intervention be- 
tween the priest and the people of the ikonostas, the 
multitude of saints lesser and great, these can be de- 
fined as none other than Orthodoxy's Oriental elements 
manifesting themselves. Especially is this true when 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 121 

their parallels are found just the other side of the 

Urals. 

St. Nicholas, the most popular of Russian saints, is 
also a deity among the heathen aborigines of Siberia. 
St. Vlas, the protector of flocks and herds, is worshiped 
by pagan members of the Empire as Volas. The com- 
parison could be carried down the entire hagiography 
with surprising results. 

Though Russia is generally reputed to be the most 
religious country in the world, it is undeniable that 
the bulk of the population, which is peasant, has only 
the faintest conception of the framework upon which 
is based the religion to which it officially belongs. The 
peasant who can satisfactorily and intelligently give 
an explanation of the articles of his creed is a rare 
exception. He will relate all sorts of legends and 
utter all manner of superstitions, but in the last analy- 
sis he knows more about the pagan customs that are 
his than about the Christian faith he nominally em- 
braces. The fundamental ideas of the Christian the- 
ological system seems either to be misunderstood by 
the peasant, or to be lost under the predominance of 
pagan influences. One does not wonder at the Mus- 
covite's inability to grasp the abstruse theology of 
the Divine Procession, Orthodoxy's creedal point of 
divergence from the West; but it is surprising to see, 
for example, how the peasant mind conceives the rela- 
tion between God the Father, and God the Son. It is 
akin to an earthly relationship of father and son. They 
are two totally distinct persons. God the Son is held 
in great sympathy as the friend of the common people 
and the enemy of the rich, perhaps not so much a liv- 
ing personality warring against the foes of the down- 



122 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

trodden moujik, as he is conceived to be a lifeless, 
shadowy figure or power, a nemesis, a deus ex machina 
that appears at crucial moments in a story to solve 
knotty problems or give utterance to the popular view 
of things. God the Father, on the other hand, is a 
vague figure, usually considered a task-master and gen- 
erally reputed to be unkind. In legends He invariably 
tries to baffle the divine ordinances and defend men 
from death as long as He can. 

The Devil is held in genial attitude of toleration. 
Of course, he is a thoroughly bad person who drives 
the trade of dragging people down to Hell; but since 
that is his business and he sticks to it faithfully, he 
should in no wise be despised. On the whole, the Devil 
is accepted with forbearance and kindliness. In one 
legend, that of "Noe the Godly," his Satanic Majesty 
is represented as the junior brother of God and fellow- 
worker in the creation of the universe. He is not the 
angel before the fall, as we hold him, but even at the 
time of the Creation a bad person, a sort of foil to 
God. 

The fabric of the moujik's conception of Heaven 
and Hell is so shot with apocryphal ideas directly trace- 
able to pagan beliefs that the design is almost obscured. 
Just as on Olympus the gods wrangled among them- 
selves and were unscrupulous to gain their ends, so 
the saints are pictured in the moujik's mind. In fact, 
so complete is the fusion of pagan and Christian ele- 
ments in his beliefs that to the observer it will be a 
moot point whether Orthodoxy has succeeded in trans- 
forming pure paganism into Christianity, or Christian- 
ity in the hands of the moujik has gradually been trans- 
formed into pure paganism. 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 123 

Both the Government and the Church in Russia have 
striven to stamp out pagan worship. The publication 
of pagan legends for the masses has been censored and 
by redoubled missionary activity the Church is attempt- 
ing to do away with many practices that are common 
among rural folk. 

Numberless customs still exist, nevertheless. The 
sowing and reaping of crops is regulated not by seasons 
and climates, but by the almanac of saints' days and 
by lucky hours. Thus wheat will not germinate, they 
say, if planted at Easter, and cabbages to be any good 
at all must be set out on Maundy Thursday. There 
are also many days on which the peasant considers it 
unlucky to work; especially is this true of Easter week. 
Instead of laboring at this season, he used to go on 
a prolonged drinking bout, and the last state of that 
man and his fields was worse than the first. 

The moujik's respect for the native fays and sprites 
is very poetic, though explicable because his life is lived 
close to Nature. Fishermen offer small propitiatory 
sacrifices to keep the house fairies or domovoi in a con- 
tented frame of mind. The roussalki, by the way, are 
very pale and very beautiful nymphs who appear by 
moonlight in rivers and lakes and streams. Clothed 
in but a crown of flowers, they stroll about singing in 
choirs, or rest upon the bank to comb their long tresses. 
To be precise, they are neither fairies nor witches, but 
the souls of the little children who have died unbap- 
tized. The domovoi, or house fairies, are a very mood- 
ish lot. You must not mention their names after twi- 
light, and if you ill-treat them they will make sleep 
impossible. If your house is blessed with good domovoi 
who love you and your children, they will do many 



124 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

things for you — they will take care of the horses, watch 
over your daughter, see that she gets a good suitor, and 
will never let you or yours know starvation. 

The znakkar, or witch doctor, is a regular institution 
in many villages, and though he apparently works in 
direct antagonism to the local priest, he is held in much 
fear. By means of spells and incantations, this char- 
latan claims to cure all sorts of ills. 

I discovered that, in the Salaiyeer Mountains, which 
lie two hundred miles south from the Trans-Siberian 
Railway in Western Siberia, when the cattle or horses 
of a peasant farmer fall sick, he does not send for the 
veterinary, but for the local shaman, or medicine man 
of the Kalmucks, who comes, and with a drum drives 
away the evil spirits. Now in that country there is 
a veterinary provided by the local government, and 
his services can be had for almost nothing, but the 
peasant seems to believe that the heathen medicine man 
effects the cure with more dispatch and efficiency. 

in 

The influence of the East manifests itself in the soul 
of the moujik in still another fashion — the nature of 
his sects. The first split in Orthodoxy came in the 
time of Nikon, in the 17th Century, and was due 
mainly to disputes over the translation of the 
Scriptures and, as we have seen, an attempt to stand- 
ardize the ritual. Behind this schism, however, there 
was a distinct mystical leaning on the part of those 
who left the body of the church. The mystical lean- 
ing is that which underlies all people whose formalism 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 125- 

is inborn as is the Russian's. He has the formalism 
of the East, and its mysticism as well. 

The later sectarians, the Doukoboors and Mullakons 
and the Strlyzic, and the host of other dissenting bod- 
ies that have appeared in Russia from time to time, 
have also invariably had for their point of divergence 
some conception of God and man's relation to Him 
that cannot be denned in terms other than those of 
pure mysticism. 

Perhaps one of the most astounding moments in the 
history of Orthodoxy came upon the promulgation of 
the Edict of the Toleration in 1905. 1 To its amaze- 
ment the Church found that many of its nominal mem- 
bers had long since embraced doctrines other than those 
taught by the Church, though for safety's sake they 
had been professing Orthodoxy. And thus, just as in 
the East religion is divided and subdivided into a mul- 
titude of small mystical sects, so in Russia today the 
divisions grow with alarming rapidity. 

The Raskolniks, or dissenters, whose numbers, by the 
way, for the entire empire, total much over two mil- 
lions, fall into two classes: the Popovshchina, those 
who permit the ministrations of priests; and the 
Bezpopovshchina, those who, repudiating sacerdotal- 
ism, choose "elders" to conduct their services. 

Of the score-odd heretical sects in Russia, the Mul- 
lakons are by far the most sane, and incidentally the 
most interesting to study. They do not run to the 

x The report of the chief procurator of the Holy Synod in 1910 
showed that several hundred thousand people nominally Orthodox 
before had joined other churches — Catholic, Mohammedan and 
Protestant mainly. The growth of Protestantism in Russia has been 
very great in the past decade. There is something about the long 
exhortations, the singing of sentimental hymns and the fiery sermons 
of Protestantism that appeals to the moujik. He likes to be stirred. 



126 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

unbalanced vagaries of their closely-related sect, the 
Doukoboors, or the hideous self-immolation of the 
Philippovsti, or the loathsome promiscuousness of the 
Byeguni, or the avowed silence of the Molchalyniki, 
or the unspeakable practices of the Khlistovstchina. 
Their name, meaning "the milk drinkers," marks one 
of their points of departure from the Orthodox faith; 
they drink milk on fast days when such indulgence is 
forbidden. They are more than Protestants; they 
boast the additional distinctive virtue of being Puri- 
tans, in fact, very rigorous Puritans. They are 
Protestants in that they protest against what they be- 
lieve to be the errors of dogma and ritual in the Ortho- 
dox Church; Puritans in that their lives are distinctly 
ascetic, in contradistinction to the lives of many of 
the Orthodox peasantry of Russia. 

Political reaction first brought the Mullakons to 
notice. In 1765 a band of them who had refused to 
bear arms and pay their taxes were arrested. Since 
then they have been an appreciable factor in Russian 
life, though they no longer refuse to serve their term 
in the army or contribute to the revenues. Obscurity 
veils their origin. A possible precursor, Dmitri Tver- 
atinov, was persecuted in 1714 for preaching Calvin- 
ism, but the supposition is that the beginnings of the 
sect are to be traced directly to the teachings of Luther, 
the seeds of the Reformation having been brought to 
Russia by those foreigners who, during the reign of 
Peter the Great, poured in hosts across the western 
frontier. From time to time, groups of Mullakons 
have been persecuted and banished. The Church has 
made efforts to bring them into the fold, always with- 
out success. Only recently the Holy Synod authorized 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 127 

a missionary campaign to the Mullakons of Siberia. 
Now and again the world hears of them — a chance 
item of news that strays over the newspaper cables; 
Tolstoy acknowledged his indebtedness to their teach- 
ings; but perhaps the oddest reference, and one which 
serves also as an excellent epitome, was that made by 
a Quaker writer in 1818, who spoke of the Mullakons 
as the "Pennsylvanians of Moscovy." To-day the 
Caucasus, tracts of Little Russia and Amurland to the 
eastward of Lake Baikal in Siberia, are their habitat. 
In Amurland, where settle many immigrants from Lit- 
tle Russia, they constitute half the population. 

The inroad of Islam, especially in Western Siberia, 
is another significant religious movement. Moslem 
traders coming up out of Turkestan or going eastward 
on the Trans-Siberian, join their efforts to the proselyt- 
ing by the Tartars already in Siberia. Against them 
the Church is sending missionaries with a view to stem- 
ming the tide. 

IV 

It is interesting to note, apropos of these sects, how 
illogical are the religious prejudices of the Orthodox 
Russian. He will start a pogrom and commit atrocities 
on the Jews, but it will never occur to him to voice 
even the slightest protest against his Mohammedan 
neighbor, the Tartar, or to pillage the local mosque. 
In fact, at Ufa a Moslem college flourishes. He will 
scorn and insult his sectarian fellow-townsmen, but 
the Mongols and Booriats and Kalmucks, who worship 
the spirits of mountains and old trees and tumbling 
rivers, he will take to his arms. 

The reason is clear enough. The rise of heretical 



128 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

sects in Russia has invariably been due not so much 
to religious revolt as to some political or economic re- 
action. Now the Moslem and the Booriat are good 
traders — trusting, veracious and above board in their 
business transactions. What more could a Russian 
ask? But the Jew and the sectarian, many Russians 
assert, are covertly shrewd, perfidious and rascally. 
Why shouldn't the Orthodox cast their heresy in their 
teeth*? 



The proof of the reality of any religion — pagan, 
Protestant, Orthodox or Catholic — is the way it acts 
under the stress of suffering and defeat. Its test is 
the test of the Resurrection — the ability to rise again 
after inglorious catastrophe and annihilation. 

Although the Russian Church has been allied with 
the powers that exploited and abused the masses, the 
faith of the Orthodox moujik has remained unshaken. 
Among the intelligentia, who were affected by Western 
modes of thinking, political defeat bred mental sulki- 
ness and decadence, but after the troublous times of 
1905 the moujik went on believing just as he did be- 
fore. 

There may be misbelief among the Russian peas- 
antry, but there is no unbelief. The atheist is a rara 
avis and sterile agnosticism unknown. This is a spir- 
itual fact that cannot be gainsaid — the Orthodox faith 
helps the moujik bear his lot in life. It gives him a 
basis for being. 

On the other hand, such unwavering devotion may 
be set down to habit rather than to the divine power 
of the Orthodox religion. While I hold no brief for 



THE MOUJIK'S RELIGION 129 

Orthodoxy, I believe that religious habit is as jus- 
tifiable and as effectual as physiological habit. There 
is just as much reason for a man crossing himself out 
of habit as there is for his breathing out of habit. 
When practice becomes subconscious to that degree, it 
is a very real part of his life. Once we grant the 
reality of the religious fact — the dependence of the 
human soul on a Supreme Being — we presuppose a 
relation that is as subconscious and habitual, but, nev- 
ertheless, as necessary as the co-relation of lung tissue 
and air. 

The Puritan may picture his God as a fearsome per- 
son dwelling a great distance off, and the moujik may 
consider Him a thoroughly companionable sort of fel- 
low at his elbow. Who can say which conception re- 
quires the more thought? The Puritan refuses to wor- 
ship with his body and the moujik refuses to worship 
without it; and the Puritan seems to enjoy himself 
censoring the ballet and music that the moujik' s body- 
religion fortunately brought into being for the world's 
delectation. 

At this point the question very naturally arises : But 
while Orthodoxy teaches the peasant how to bear with 
his lot and to meet death face-fronted, does it teach 
him how to live — teach him not to pick and steal, not 
to lie and slander and speak evil? 

Unquestionably it does. Religion without some 
ethics will not last a generation, and Orthodoxy has 
lasted for seven centuries. The Hell of the Orthodox 
dogma is all too real and the Heaven all too beautiful 
to permit a universal laxness on such everyday matters 
of living. In viewing this, as in examining any re- 
ligious faiths, we are obliged to remember that evil 



130 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

and good are matters of relative value. What is wrong 
for John Smith of Erie, Pa., may be perfectly 
legitimate for Ivan Ivanovitch of Ekaterinburg. More- 
over, one must not lose sight of the two different con- 
ceptions of religion held by East and West. 

We of the West insist that religion and ethics must 
be one and inseparable. This is not the rule of the 
East, nor can we expect to find it in the Russian mael- 
strom of East and West. The East makes a distinc- 
tion between the two — and lives accordingly. The 
West makes no distinction in theory, but separates 
them as far as the poles in the practices of everyday 
life. 

The great difficulty in finding a clear definition for 
the moujik's religion lies in the fact that it is not wholly 
Eastern nor wholly Western, that it is not altogether 
pagan nor altogether Christian. It is a mingling of 
religion and ethics — with religion and dogma predomi- 
nant. 

Yet to me there is something distinctly tangible and 
worth while about the moujik's religion. It is "o' the 
very stuff of life and self of self." Call it idolatrous, 
call it casually habitual, call it what you will — it is 
the foundation of his life, he feeds on it, leans on it, 
and when the end comes it helps him die happy and 
confident. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 

UNTIL the war started, the best Russian busi- 
ness men were Germans. For the ex- 
traordinary fact about the Russian as a busi- 
ness man is that he is such a poor business man — judg- 
ing him by American standards of business efficiency. 
The concept of public service which is fast becoming 
the foundation of all our commerce and industry is 
a lesson the average Russian merchant has still to learn. 
The principles of business cooperation, and sometimes 
even of personal business honesty, have still to be mas- 
tered. In this, as in so many other phases, Russia is 
a gauche adolescent. 



Much has been written of late about Russian credits 
and commercial hands across the seas. America, rich 
in gold and efficient in business methods at home, seeks 
new markets in the great Slav Empire. This is as it 
should be. Russia is an importing nation rather than 
an exporting; she needs our wares and we need her 
trade. Doubtless the day will come when the United 
States and Russia will be the two great commercial 
nations of the world. Meantime, there are many les- 
sons for both peoples to learn and great improvements 
to be made on either side. 

131 



132 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

While every effort will be made by Berlin and by 
London to capture Russian credits and Russian mar- 
kets after the war, the fact remains that Russia is old 
enough now to carry her own dinner pail, and that 
America can both furnish the pail and put something 
into it. The vast resources of her arable lands — her 
wheat lands in European Russia alone are larger than 
the American fields — will always keep her an agricul- 
tural country, yet the growth of her industries, the 
growth of her mining, petroleum and railway projects 
has already made her a power in industry worthy of 
American consideration. 

To the average American merchant intent on finding 
a new market for his wares, these questions generally 
arise : 

"Can I sell him anything'?" 

"How good pay is he 4 ?" 

"What can he sell me?' 

This simple analysis has formed the basis of Amer- 
ican commerce abroad. Because it does not fully cover 
the situation, our markets in foreign parts are not as 
secure as they might be. Time and again American 
exporters find themselves beaten out and undersold by 
foreign firms. Especially is this true in South Amer- 
ica. We have not gone much beyond asking ourselves 
in a self -admiring sort of way, "Well, I wonder what 
I can get the South American to buy?" 

The German has done it much better. He has sent 
agents out to study the requirements of the markets. 
The merchant in Berlin has a fairly clear notion of 
the sort of people who are buying his wares in South 
America, what the consignees are like, what the jour- 
ney from Hamburg to Rio de Janeiro requires of a 



THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 133 

package and in what shape the native merchant wants 
to receive his consignment. With all our boasted in- 
dustrial efficiency, Americans have even failed to learn 
how to wrap packages so that they will ship safely to 
South America! Our wares are poorly crated and 
marked in English — which not one native in a thou- 
sand understands. And so the German trader, whose 
base of supplies is 1 1,000 miles away, wins in the com- 
petition with the American exporter who has to send 
his goods only a scant 6,000 miles. 

I have dwelt at some length on the South American 
situation because it finds its parallel in Russia. On 
the wharves at Archangel are thousands of crates from 
America, scores of them stenciled in red, "This Side 
Up," "Glass," "Use No Hooks," "Handle With 
Care." Imagine the bewilderment of the moujik long- 
shoresman at such cabalistic signs ! x He hasn't the 
slightest notion what they are all about, so he wields 
his hook valiantly and tumbles the cases upside down, 
and laughs at the funny tinkle the crates make inside. 
And the Russian merchant, in turn, wonders what sort 
of fool the American merchant must be that he sends 
him broken goods! 

In doing business with Russia the American export- 
er's first problem should not be about what he can per- 
suade the Russian to buy, but "What is the Russian 
merchant like 4 ?" "What sort of people does he sell 
to*?" "What are the needs of those people individually 
and collectively'?" 

The best way to settle such questions is for the mer- 

*In 1916 the Russian Government transported several thousands of 
Buriats from Central Asia to act as longshoresmen on the wharves 
at Archangel. Few of them can speak Russian, much less read it — 
which adds to the humor of this situation. 



134 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

chant to go to Russia himself and find out. Certainly 
he will not want for a hearty welcome ; no people under 
the sun are more hospitable than the Russ. In lieu 
of that he can send a representative. American colleges 
each year graduate scores of men who can speak French 
and German, bright, brisk young lads with an eye to 
business who, after a year or so studying the home 
plant and its output, could be sent to Russia to scout 
around for the answer to these questions. Or, if that 
is not feasible, the manufacturer can avail himself of 
our Consular Trade Reports, which are the most up- 
to-date and efficient of all the nations — even the Brit- 
ish concede this. Finally, the American exporter may 
find it to his interest to communicate with the Amer- 
ican-Russian Chamber of Commerce in New York, 
which was organized in 1916 for the purpose of en- 
couraging and promoting a closer union in industry, 
commerce and finance, and "to create bonds of mutual 
sympathy between the two great nations — Russia and 
the United States." Its motto is, "To be close to 
Russia means first of all to know, to understand 
Russia." 

Just what form the actual exporting might take can 
best be learned from the experience of other nations. 
The Germans, who know more about Russian trade 
than any other people, have given up the idea of 
branch houses as impractical. The English have about 
reached the same conclusion. Instead, they have lately 
been developing the market through travelers who 
carry large assortments of samples, quote prices 
F.O.B. a Russian port and, if necessary, include the 
price of duty and local delivery in their estimate of 
the cost. The American merchant, once he has learned 



THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 135 

the needs of the market, had best employ a Russian 
selling agent or avail himself of the facilities of an 
exporting firm. For the convenience of local dealers, 
he should see to it that prices, sizes, weights, etc., are 
worked out in Russian figures and that packages are 
marked so that the native can read them. 

In the course of her development in the next few 
decades Russia will require many kinds of articles, but 
the two that America is best fitted to furnish are good 
machinery and high-class fabrics. We have already 
made a name for American machinery in Russia but 
we have still to create a demand for such luxuries as 
fine silk underwear and stockings and the higher grades 
of woolen articles. We cannot compete with the low- 
priced labor of Japan and Germany and Russia itself 
in furnishing a cheap line of these goods. Our best 
opportunity is to create a market for American luxuries. 
When a woman buys perfume in Russia she asks for 
French perfume, despite the fact that some very fine 
scents are made in Moscow. There is no reason why, 
with proper development of the market, that same 
woman should not habitually ask for American silk 
underwear and silk stockings and fine woolens. 

n 

In dealing with Russian merchants, Americans must 
remember that there are methods and concepts of busi- 
ness widely differing from his own. The Russian mer- 
chant has still much of the East in his veins. He is 
accustomed to the interminably slow methods of the 
East, to haggling, to looking for his own little back- 
sheesh, to enjoying the advantages of long credits, and 



136 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

to having a thoroughly good time. Moreover, this 
merchant has to deal with hosts of people who neither 
read nor write and to whom ocular proof is the only 
advertisement. 

Enter a Russian bank, for example. The business 
is usually conducted on the second floor, as second- 
story men have not become so expert in Russia as here. 
At the front door stands a soldier in uniform, a saber 
at his side and a bayoneted gun over his shoulder. You 
mount the stairs. Another soldier, armed to the teeth, 
stands on the landing. You step on to the banking 
floor. A third soldier eyes you from the corner. You 
have a notion that you've blundered into a barracks 
by mistake. You are quite wrong. The soldiers are 
there to assure the people that their funds are being 
safely guarded. It is another phase of the ocular proof 
that the native requires. 

You step up to the cash window and present your 
checks. The teller is playing with an abacus — our 
electric-run counting machines are practically unknown 
in Russian banks. Courteously, although a bit lan- 
guidly, he receives your papers and asks you to wait. 
You retire to a corner. Fifteen minutes pass, twenty, 
half an hour. You step up to the window to see what 
action you can get. The teller and the other clerks 
are drinking tea and nibbling snacks of luncheon. You 
go back to your seat wondering what it is all about. 

The fact is that the Russian banker, merchant, ma- 
chinist, day laborer — all classes, in fact — stop at eleven 
and four for tea. To drink unboiled water in Russia 
is to fly in the face of Providence, so tea is regularly 
served out twice a day and many times in between. 



THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 137 

This, of course, halts the wheels of industry and bank- 
ing, but you must accustom yourself to it. 

Finally, when tea is over, the matter of your checks 
is taken up again, and after half an hour or more, you 
are handed over to a higher official. He will chat 
with you pleasantly about America, about relatives 
he has there, about the Woolworth Tower, the Singer 
Building, the Grand Canon and the rest of the seven 
wonders of America. He will be persistent, for even 
the busiest Russian is courteous enough to show in- 
terest in you and your land. When you have satisfied 
him with bits of news from America, he will, like as 
not, ask you personal questions — "Have you been to 
Russia before?" "What do you think of our tea*? 
Our churches'? Our music"? Our cigarettes'? Our 
padded isvostiks?" 

Then about two hours after you have entered the 
building, you begin to see light ahead. And when a 
good part of the day has passed, you are able to take 
your leave of the banker and pass between the rows 
of sentries again to the street. 

All this is very exasperating to an American to whom 
the business of cashing a traveler's check is only a mat- 
ter of seconds, but it is the way of the Russ, and one 
must do as the Russians do so long as he deals with 
them. There is no use trying to talk about American 
speed and efficiency; it will be like speaking in a for- 
eign tongue. The Russian is slow, he likes being slow, 
he has been slow for generations. But, despite that, 
he manages to accomplish a fair amount of business. 

I am often tempted to think that one reason why 
the Russian merchant is such a poor business man is 
that he is too fond of enjoying himself. Eating and 



138 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

drinking must be the king of indoor sports for this Russ. 
The proverbial protracted New York business luncheon 
is only a hasty bite compared with the collation the 
Russian sits down to in mid-afternoon. Business is 
such a bother and eating is such fun that, on the whole, 
the Russian merchant would rather eat. 

There is another way of looking at the same situa- 
tion. The Russian has learned a salient truth that 
Americans utterly lack. He believes — and acts ac- 
cordingly — that it is far more important to make a 
life than to make a living. According to his stand- 
ards, American business men are merely machines, 
slaves to commerce, dollar grabbers. The more I see 
of American business, the more I am inclined to believe 
that there is much to be said for this Russian view. 

Despite your efforts to the contrary, the Russian mer- 
chant will insist on bartering. Americans sell, Rus- 
sians haggle. Russia has not yet grown out of the habit 
of fairs where haggling is a fine art. Nijni Novgorod 
is still a big factor in her business year, and there are 
hundreds of such fairs on a smaller scale all over the 
Empire where you buy everything from Singer Sew- 
ing-machines to fossil mastodon ivory. 

Likewise, the Russian merchant is often amenable 
to a personal financial inducement. Add to every bid 
made in Russia about 25% for distribution among 
worthy traders, and you have struck a safe average on 
which to do business. This may be lamentable, but 
it is true, and one must adjust himself to the situation. 
One will find that in practically every walk of life and 
in every sort of business, there are Russians capable 
of being bribed ; more, they expect to be bribed. 

Here again is a situation an American merchant may 



THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 139 

fail to comprehend. Imagine, if you can, a New York 
merchant being amenable to a bribe. . . . But possi- 
bly you can imagine it! The Russian is out and out 
in his dickering about such things. On the whole, we 
are more honest than the Russian, but I am inclined 
to believe that the difference is merely a matter of the 
terms we use and that no invidious comparisons can 
be made. Russia is young in business, her methods are 
the t^lunt, stumbling methods of youth. Some day she 
may become polished and subtle in commerce, and 
then we will call her shrewd, capable, masterly ! 
• The classic example of graft in Russia happened 
during the building of the Trans-Siberian Railway. 
We generally conceive of that railroad as a straight 
line cleaving the heart of the continent. Far from it. 
When the road was building a brilliant band of agents 
traveled ahead of the construction gangs and visited 
the city fathers of the towns on the proposed route. 
They told what the proximity of the railroad would 
mean to the town, and in glowing colors painted the 
far-famed American "boost." Then the agents got 
down to business; for such and such considerations 
they would see that the line came to the town, etc., 
etc. Tomsk, then the largest city in Siberia, waved 
these agents away. Tomsk could afford to. But the 
agents made good their word. The tracks wefe run 
south of Tomsk by 48 miles, and to-day the intellectual 
and mining center of Siberia is on a branch line! 

The results of this tariff can be seen all along the 
route to-day. Here is the station settlement; yonder 
on the horizon is the suggestion of the town. When 
the agents came to explain to Petersburg the snaking 
of the line, they offered a plausible excuse — had the 



140 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

railroad gone through the center of the towns they 
would not grow so rapidly as though it were laid some 
distance away; as it was, the towns would now grow 
to the railroad. And this, luckily, is what has hap- 
pened ! 

Another outcropping of the East can be seen in the 
Russian's readiness to go into bankruptcy, and his in- 
sistence on long-time payments. Here are two situa- 
tions against which the American exporter must safe- 
guard himself. Until recently, the money in Russia 
was tied up in the hands of the few; with the growth 
of industries consequent on the war and just previous 
to it, much of the money has been transferred to the 
people. This distribution will result in a more healthy 
financial situation. Instead of spending their money, 
as heretofore, for vodka, the common people have been 
saving it, and with the increased business sense that 
comes from abstinence from drink, will come intelli- 
gence in spending money and conscientiousness in pay- 
ing debts. 

Several American firms have met this situation by 
the installment-paying plan, and they have been suc- 
cessful. The results have come slowly, but they have 
come through this patience and belief in the people. 
American sewing-machines, American harvesters, Amer- 
ican lamps will be seen in every part of the Russian 
Empire. They are there to stay, despite German com- 
petition, because in these instances American goods 
are superior to others and because American merchants 
have met the Russian consumer on his own ground. 

Trade with Russia must, of necessity, be built up 
slowly. It must have its basis in a mutual understand- 
ing of the two peoples concerned. 



THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 141 



in 



The other day a banker asked me these two leading 
questions : 

"Why is it so difficult for us to float a Russian loan 
whereas, during the Japanese War, we had no trouble 
in floating a Japanese loan 1 ?" 

"Is there any chance of Russia repudiating her debts 
accrued during this war 1 ?" 

My answers took the following form : 

During the Japanese War, Japanese bonds were 
hawked about America and they had the backing of 
Jewish banking firms. Scarcely a Jewish pawnbroker 
in America but was approached to buy them. Hun- 
dreds did. You can never consider any financial situ- 
ation regarding Russia without taking into account 
the bitter hatred of the Jew for the Russian. It comes 
out in a thousand different little ways, and it has as 
many sources of power to draw on. There is as much 
to say against the Jewish methods as there is against 
Russia's methods in handling the Jewish problem ; the 
blame is about equally divided. Meantime, neither 
will concede the other a point and the fight is a draw, 
with Russians always quiescently and sometimes vio- 
lently anti-Semitic, and the Jews actively anti-Russian 
in every quarter of the globe. 

German influence has also to be counted. As they 
used to say in Europe, of all the colonies Germany pos- 
sessed, Russia was the most profitable. The industries 
were almost entirely in German hands and much of 
the mining was maintained by German money. Ger- 
man influence was so strong that it could foment revo- 
lutions and call strikes whenever there was the slight- 



142 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

est chance that foreign capital might endanger Ger- 
man interests in Russia. When France began to be 
financially interested in Russia, Germany threatened 
that, should Russia enter into an agreement with 
France, she would consider the act tantamount to a 
declaration of war. In short, Germany has held Rus- 
sia in the hollow of her financial hand, and she will use 
every available influence in other lands against the 
floating of Russian loans. 

In 1904 Germany exported goods to Russia valued 
at 50,000,000 marks; by 1913 she had raised those 
export figures to 800,000,000 marks. When Russia 
came out of the Japanese conflict, she was weakened 
commercially. It was a war of governments and not of 
peoples. Germany knew this all too well. She dick- 
ered with the Russian Government and found its price. 
Russia was forced into signing a commercial treaty that 
was thoroughly one-sided, and in the years that fol- 
lowed Germany reaped every possible benefit from 
the arrangement. 

If Russia can free herself from the German indus- 
trial and commercial yoke, if the German merchants 
(there are some 400,000 of them now interned in Rus- 
sia) are made to return to their own country after 
the war, then there will be a legitimate chance for fair 
competition for Russian markets. Fortunately, Rus- 
sia has had sufficient power to keep a hold on some of 
her industries and during the war to develop other 
industries. It is to be hoped that, after peace is de- 
clared, she will hold her own against a repetition of 
Teutonic commercial subjugation. 



THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 143 

IV 

The idea of Russia's repudiating her debts is rather 
fantastic. A nation repudiates its debts only when it 
is permitted to do so. Were Russia utterly lacking 
in natural resources and were she not allied with pow- 
ers that have strong financial foundations and keen 
financial understanding, one might fear for Russia's 
future action. But she has endless resources and un- 
told wealth, and she is leagued with nations that hold 
her so in their debt that they can not only guide but 
even force her hand, if that is necessary. 

France, which among the powers has the clearest 
understanding of international finance, was not loath 
to loan Russia money. Should she permit Russia to 
repudiate her debts, thousands of French investors 
would be wiped out. England has done the same. 
Russia owes too much money to repudiate a copeck of 
her debts. 

In the great game of dollars that underlay this con- 
flict, Germany placed her money on the wrong horse. 
She believed that she held sufficient power at Petro- 
grad to control the Russian Government, even though 
Russia were her enemy. Constant rumors of a sep- 
arate peace, drifting out from Berlin news agencies, 
indicated this belief to be strong even as late as the 
fall of 1916. Even at that hour Germany's horse was 
leading in Russia. Then came the flare-up between 
the Douma and the Government, between the people 
and the pro-German element at Petrograd; Germany 
discovered that this was a people's war and that the 
people were dictating to their Government. In 1902 
the war was a juggling of finance; in 1914-16, it be- 



144 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

came a conflict of ideals, the struggle of the Russian 
people to assert their own nationality in their own land. 

Upon the Russian people, upon their willingness to 
work in legitimate competition and just cooperation 
will depend the development of Russian resources. 

A nation is no longer great merely for its statesmen, 
but great because of its workers — its farmers, its pud- 
dlers, its spinners, its shopkeepers. In these Russia is 
great indeed. She has the workers and the raw ma- 
terial and the willingness. The productivity of the 
people has increased 40% during the war. Russia now 
needs only capital to develop these vast resources and 
to bring them to the markets of the world. 

She needs railroads. Even though the war has com- 
manded most of the Government's attention, there has 
been found sufficient time, funds and energy to push 
ahead the work on new lines that total some 8,000 
miles through untouched parts of the Empire. There 
are 45,000 miles of railroads in operation to-day. 1 
Two-thirds of them are operated by the Government, 
the other third being owned and operated by private 
companies working under State control and with State 
guarantee. Plans are now made for the completion of 
25,000 miles of tracks by the end of 1922, in addition 
to thousands of miles of canals. 

The Trans-Siberian has been double-tracked through- 
out its entire length ; the Amur Railroad, which reaches 
over the shoulder of North Manchuria, has finally been 
completed; and a line extending from the Caspian 
across southwest Asia to Minusinsk and up to the trunk 

*In European Russia there are 16 miles of railroad per thousand 
square miles of territory; in Asiatic Russia, 2. Compare this with 
other nations: In the United States, 65 miles; in France, 142; in 
Germany, 176; in Great Britain, 181. 



THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 145 

line of the Trans-Siberian is now about finished. Each 
of these means the opening up of great stretches of 
territory. The Amur and its subsidiary lines link the 
Lena gold fields with the outer world, territory as rich 
if not richer than our Klondike, and the Trans-Caspian 
brings the immense wheat and cattle lands into touch 
with their markets. 

In these railroads will be found another answer to 
the rumor of Russia's repudiating her debts, for in them 
lies the future development of the Empire. Consid- 
ered as a whole, Russia to-day is in about the same state 
as the Dakotas were thirty years ago, when the rail- 
roads were just breaking through to open up the rich 
land to settlers and commerce. 



The lack of an all-year port has been the greatest de- 
terrent to Russian commercial progress. It has forced 
her to play into German hands. On all sides she is 
faced with alien control. In the south the Turk has 
maintained his grip on the Dardanelles; England holds 
the Persian Gulf; Japan holds Dalny and a goodly 
strip of the Liaotung Peninsula. Archangel and Vladi- 
vostok are frozen tight as drums for several months 
each year. The new port of Alexandrovsk on the 
White Sea is free from ice all the year, and a new trunk 
line links it up with the chief branches that radiate 
from Petrograd and Moscow. While Alexandrovsk 
will help the situation somewhat, Russia can never 
grow commercially until she has a warm water outlet 
for her immense stores. That she would be awarded 



146 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

this in Constantinople, has been the dream of her peo- 
ple in this war. 

Self-contained though she is, Russia requires the con- 
tact of commerce to develop her. She needs to rub 
up against other nations. Too long has she been iso- 
lated and exploited by one power. Her rich wheat 
fields, her bountiful oil supplies, her gold deposits, her 
platinum mines, her cattle and her timber — all these 
she has to offer the world. The Continent needs her 
wheat, her butter, her meat. Under the guise of 
Danish butter, England eats the Russian product regu- 
larly. New York tasted Siberian butter in the winter 
of 1913-4. Russian butter on American bread — what 
a combination to contemplate ! 

Once let Russia open her granaries directly to the 
world through the Dardanelles, and the food situation 
both on the Continent and in America will be radically 
changed. Chicago will be forced out of her wheat-pit 
deals against the American people. But so long as this, 
the second greatest granary of the world, is closed, and 
no competition is permitted, our wheat kings will have 
us at their mercy. 

VI 

There have been some grand times in Russian history 
when the Government, with a fine disregard for con- 
sequences, has followed the dictates of its conscience, 
when the Tsar, with the mystic fortitude of an early 
Christian, has ordered reforms for his people that shiv- 
ered the nation to its very foundations. The freeing 
of the serfs in the '6o's of the 20th Century was one 
such time, and the prohibition of vodka another. 

The effect of the vodka prohibition on the people 



THE RUSSIAN AS A BUSINESS MAN 147 

has been touched on elsewhere. Let us see what hap- 
pened to the Government. Forthwith it lost its largest 
single item of revenue — it came to $450,000,000 in 
1913. 1 Had the ukase been promulgated in times of 
peace, the immediate economic situation would have 
been bad enough. As it was a time of war, it threw 
Russia's finances into utter chaos. This reform was 
purely idealistic, a mad movement for the attaining 
of a dream, uninfluenced by any self-interest on the 
part of the Government. Yet other industries have 
been found which will eventually bring the hungry 
state an equal measure of revenue without endangering 
the health and morals of the people. 

Thus far the railroad monopoly has not paid the 
Government, and such profits as are being made are 
regularly turned back into further development. The 
Government's best chance for a paying monopoly, then, 
is to bridle one or more of the many syndicates that 
regularly trade in Russia. There is much talk of the 
sugar industry's being taken over, some of the match 
and tea industries. The sugar monopoly ought to net 
the Government not less than $50,000,000 a year, the 
sugar beet industry being one of the principal develop- 
ments of the agricultural life of European Russia. 
Over 2,000,000 acres are devoted to sugar beets alone, 
and the annual export of refined sugar averages 200,- 
000 tons per annum. 

The consumption of tea in Russia is quite beyond 
ordinary comprehension. When one reads that the 

1 It is interesting to note that, while Russia with a population of 
182,000,000 spent $450,000,000 for liquor in 1913, Great Britain's bill 
came to $835,000,000 and the United States to $1,750,000,000. These 
figures, however, must not be construed as placing Russia at the foot 
of the list in liquor consumption, the extreme cheapness of the vodka 
being a qualifying factor. 



148 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Empire drinks up 166,000,000 pounds of tea each year, 
he can immediately see another industry that the Gov- 
ernment might monopolize for the increase of reve- 
nue. Already the Government owns the largest of the 
five tea factories in the Empire. 

The Russian Government has no intention of re- 
turning to its previous liquor monopoly and has stated 
so emphatically through its Minister of Finance, M. 
Barck. In other words, the Government does not in- 
tend that the nation shall slip back into the pitfall of 
drink that kept it in darkness for so many years. 

It is with a sober, frugal Russia that the American 
merchant will have to deal, a nation alert to its oppor- 
tunities and keenly alive to its resources. Let an in- 
fusion of American business methods and competitive 
acumen be introduced into Russian commerce, and the 
world will stand in awe of the results. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 



ON the heights above Fersoova we fell among 
artelchiks. The hare track that skirts the 
Shilka Ridge was too narrow at that point, 
and too slippery for our ponies and the workmen to 
pass abreast. Besides, passers-by on the Shilka Trakt 
are few — that is, desirable passers-by. Trans-Baikal ia 
bears an unenviable reputation for brodaji, the mur- 
derous vagrants and escaped convicts of Siberia. But 
these strangers appeared harmless enough, despite their 
fearsome beards. 

They were fully a dozen stalwart, middle-aged men 
led by an ancient of days bearing a kit of carpenter's 
tools. Some had bulging sacks slung over their shoul- 
ders, some tea kettles dangling at their belts. All were 
poorly clothed — rude sheepskin tulups or great coats, 
gaudy red and blue work shirts, with tails flaunting 
above trouser tops, knee-high boots, and black sugar- 
loaf sheep-skin hats. They were journeying up the 
river to Blagowestchensk to build a house, they said. 
Yes, we were right, they formed an artel, one of those 
communistic bands of workmen that comprise the 
nucleus of the Russian peasant industrial system. True 
to Russian hospitality, they begged us to ride back to 

149 



150 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

a clearing in the wood where a fire could be built and 
tea made. And there it was that we talked of artels 
and cooperation, and all those unaccountable socialistic 
things that exist in the heart of autocratic Moscovy. 

"So you are Americanski," began the ancient after 
the manner of the peasant. "Americanski. ... A 
great country yours. Every one gets rich in America." 

"No, only a few are rich," I hastened to assure him. 
"The working people are mostly poor — and most 
every one works." 

"And do they have artels?" 

"They have unions. . . ." 

"No, artels, like we are. I have read of your unions. 
We can't have them here. They're not allowed." He 
seemed to catch the look of confusion on my face and 
went on to explain. "We work together, we men. We 
are a carpenter's artel. When you want to build a 
house, you hire us. When you pay, you pay me. I 
take the money and pay the expenses and then we share 
up. I am the starosta." 

He went on further to explain how the artel works, 
how it may be devoted to one trade or a part of one 
trade or to several trades, but the rule holds through- 
out that the members earn share and share alike. A 
leader known as the starosta is chosen, and upon him 
devolves the management of the band's affairs. He 
arranges for passports, seeks out work, provides tools, 
materials and supplies, collects wages and distributes 
the profits equally. 

When he had finished and was sipping noisily the 
hot tea, we sat wondering where else on the globe was 
there such confidence in the honesty of a leader. Had 
we discovered Utopia here ,in the heart of Siberia*? We 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 151 

let the question rest for a time, and satisfied ourselves 
with asking if all the artels wandered about from place 
to place. 

"Not all," he said thoughtfully, "but you meet us 
everywhere." And he swept the horizon with an in- 
clusive gesture. "On every road, on every farm, in 
every town and city from Vilna to Vladivostok you 
will find us. Even in the baron's houses the servants 
will form an artel; even the convicts and the exiles do 
the same. Some stay in one place, others just wander 
about from place to place, taking the work where they 
find it. Some get very rich. We are very poor." 

The last he had said not in any spirit of discontent, 
but just as a statement of the fact. Riches and poverty 
alike come from God, the faithful Russian believes. 

"Your men must trust you," we interposed. "Work- 
men in America do not often trust their foremen as 
your men do." 

He began to laugh and stroke his beard, for the com- 
pliment pleased him. 

"They aren't like us, that's why. We have learned 
to trust each other. We have always been peasants," 
he went on naively. "And for four hundred years we 
were serfs, bound to the soil. We learned in those long 
years to help one another and to work together. We 
could not trust our masters, because they did us wrong, 
so we clung together. A peasant is always a peasant. 
We didn't cease being peasants because we were freed. 
We ceased being slaves. We have been free now nearly 
sixty years, but we still work together. That is why 
we have artels. You have unions — yes — I have read 
of them. Instead we have artels. Unions are national 
— all over the country — and those the government for- 



152 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

bids here. But the artel is just a few — like we are." 
He fell to his tea again. 

To the Russian, forming an artel is as natural as 
breathing. This seems true of the entire peasant body. 
Over the glasses, for example, a project is discussed, 
and forthwith an artel formed and a starosta elected. 
Next to no funds are required, some artels starting 
with as little capital as fifteen dollars. The work may 
be sweeping the streets, building houses, or, as in many 
sections, the development of the kustarny, the cottage 
industries for which Russia has become famous of late 
years. 

As we went on our way down the trakt, the words 
of the starosta began to arrange themselves in their 
proper category. What he had stated was the peasant 
view of the matter. Their power of cooperation was 
due to the fact that they had been obliged for four 
centuries to cooperate that they might defend their 
all-too-few rights. And not yet had they ceased being 
peasants, although they had been free men for half 
a century. 

Later in the journey we called upon the president 
of the local bank at Blagowestchensk, the New York 
of Siberia, a thriving town on the Amur that is truly 
American in many aspects. Having been in America, 
M. Gordhon knew our institutions and spoke our 
tongue. To him we applied for the other side of the 
peasant's story. Yes, our friends of the Shilka Trakt 
had been right, class solidarity had been born of class 
suffering. 

"But you must make this distinction," he said with 
emphasis. "Whereas the peasants did suffer many 
things and are suffering them to-day, their masters have 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 153 

not been altogether cruel. In no country is so much 
being done for the furtherance of the peasants' in- 
terests. Have you seen the handicrafts of the peas- 
ants?" 

We mentioned places where we had seen them for 
sale, and the villages where they were being made. 

"Well, then you know. They are born artists. And 
so long as they remain craftsmen, their work will be 
artistic. It has grown more artistic as it came down 
from generation to generation. These cottage indus- 
tries are only just being heard of in the big world out- 
side. London flocks to an exhibition of the wares. 
Paris goes wild over them. They bring large sums in 
New York. And yet the cottage industries of Russia 
have been going on for generations. You used to have 
them in America." 

"A few exist to-day," we assured him. "In Deer- 
field, an old town of the Connecticut Valley, and at 
Hingham, in Massachusetts, and in other places." 

He smiled, "What would you say if I told you that 
there are ten to twelve million people in Russia em- 
ployed in cottage industries alone?" 

He let the figure settle in our minds, lit another 
cigarette, and went on in that thoughtful manner bank- 
ers the world over seem to have when they discuss 
economic matters. 

"During the past twenty-five years Russia has seen 
an unprecedented growth of her urban industries. The 
factory hand has become an element to conjure with. 
Foreign capital and our national desire to foster home 
industries — the latter furthered by a high tariff — have 
turned many cities into thriving manufacturing cen- 
ters. Compare Moscow of twenty-five years ago with 



154 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Moscow to-day. I remember it as it was then. The 
growth has been wonderful! Peasants who used to 
live on their crops are flocking to the cities in winter. 
In summer many are back on the farm again. The 
number of factory hands totals over one and a half 
million, this not including Poland and Finland." 

"You mean then that the cottage industries are fall- 
ing off?" 

"Quite the reverse, quite. Compare the figures — ten 
to twelve million workers in the kustarny to one and a 
half million workers in the factories ! No, the develop- 
ment of the kustarny during the past three decades has 
been spontaneous and widespread through the Empire. 
Whole villages that used to depend on farming for 
their livelihood have now formed themselves into 
artels, and are working the full twelve months at these 
industries. Some farm half the year and work indoors 
the rest of the time. It is most astonishing." 

"But how do you account for such a contradictory 
state of affairs?" we asked. "There is no denying that 
the peasant makes only a meager living out of his crops, 
and when his crops fail he starves. If he goes to the 
city, there is work in the factory. He no longer has 
to bother his head about the farm. It is human na- 
ture to expect the advantages of the factory to over- 
come his native attachment to the soil." 

"It may be human nature, but it is not the Slav na- 
ture." M. Gordhon replied slowly. "When you 
sound the depths of the Slav you will find that he ex- 
ercises to a remarkable degree what might be called 
spiritual frugality. He is self-contained, just as Rus- 
sia is self-contained. He is naturally resourceful. We 
were speaking of the cottage industries. They are 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 155 

worked by artels. It is true that their power for 
cooperation, as shown in the artel, is due to the peas- 
ants' having cooperated for their own benefit through 
four centuries, but it is also true that the peasant has 
within himself many talents. He is primarily the 
farmer, the tiller of the soil, the man with the hoe. 
But he has learned many other arts. Though he is 
slow to learn them, years of training and years of 
necessity have taught him to develop his own natural 
talents." 

"The knack for making things is not native with the 
peasant*?" 

"Partly yes, partly no. You must remember that 
while much has been written on the sufferings of the 
Russian peasant during his days of serfdom, little men- 
tion is made of the great good rendered him by many 
of his masters. There are two sides to every story, and 
there are two sides to his. An honest and persistent 
effort was made by many of the nobility all over the 
empire to furnish employment for their serfs during 
those long winter nights and days when inclement and 
frigid weather prevented their tilling the soil. Where 
else than Russia could you find such generosity?" 

"It was done by slave owners in the southern states 
of America." I proffered the information. 

"Well, then you have an analogy. What some of 
your slave owners did, the serf owners here in Russia 
were doing. The negro and the peasant alike owe their 
knowledge of handicraft to their masters. Of course, 
there was their own innate gift for making things with 
the hands that all people of the soil possess, and there 
was their mutual endeavor which has found expression 



156 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

in the artel. And there you have both sides of the story 
of the artel and kustarny." 

"The government is encouraging these cottage in- 
dustries, of course." 

"Yes, I was going to mention that." He reached 
for a book behind his desk and ran his ringer down a 
column of figures. "The report of the Department of 
Rural Economy shows that there are twelve technical 
schools teaching handicraft, that the kustarny stores 
and workshops were subsidized by the Government, 
the budget for this work amounting to over half a mil- 
lion roubles annually." He glanced up from the book. 
"There is, in addition, the assistance rendered by the 
Zemstvos or local governments. They often act as 
middlemen, supplying the raw materials and handling 
the finished product. Here you can see on the map 
just where the kustarny are located." He unfolded 
the colored map and read us rapidly figures and facts. 

"The Governments of Moscow, Vladimir, Tver, 
Kostroma, Nijni Novgorod and Jaroslav are where the 
handicrafts thrive especially. Though the products 
and the labor are widely diversified, the output falls 
into five groups: wood, metal, other minerals, leather 
and woven goods. Of these the largest and most 
important is the wood industry. One district manu- 
factures 2,000 sleighs annually in addition to carts 
and other vehicles. Seven thousand tarantasses 
come from Vladimir alone each year. Kaluga with its 
2,200 workmen and 900 shops turns out barrels. 
Eighty-seven villages of the Moscow Government make 
rude peasant-painted furniture. One hundred and 
twenty shops in the same district are devoted to toys, 
employing 2,000 peasants, and turning out each year 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 157 

a supply worth $250,000. In the Tver Government 
6,000 peasants make nothing but pump handles, whilst 
another 2,000 are employed in extracting tar from 
trees. It is reckoned that fully 100,000 men are en- 
gaged in making cart wheels in the various villages 
of Great Russia. In point of output, the wooden spoon 
industry is the largest. These painted and lacquered 
spoons are used all over the empire, and find a ready 
market in the Far East, China being the chief customer, 
with Persia as a close second. Fully 100,000,000 are 
made each year, most of them coming from the Vladi- 
mir and Kursk Governments. To make a spoon often 
requires the labors of fifteen different artels — think of 
it, fifteen artels — although for the poorer quality one 
man is sufficient. A good handicrafter can turn out 
150 of the spoons in a day. The bulk, however, goes 
through at least three separate processes, employing 
three artels. The profits for a worker rarely amount to 
more than $20 a year. 

"Bast and limewood sandals worn by the peasantry 
generally come from the village of Simeonofka and 
the city of Nijni Novgorod, where during a season of 
five months a rapid worker can finish 400 pairs. 
Baskets are made principally in the district of Zweni- 
gorod, and mats in Kostroma. Linen is woven at 
Jaroslav, and in most villages spinning-wheels and 
distaffs are made. Tver is the main book country; in 
one town fifty-five per cent of the population are em- 
ployed. At Tver 350 workmen prepare annually 
$40,000 worth of finished leather. 

"There you see what staple articles are made. Those 
are only a few." He spread out the map impressively. 
"Look at the finer arts. Peasant jewelry is made in 



158 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

fifty villages on the Volga in the Kostroma Govern- 
ment. Some of it is valuable indeed, much is cheap 
and tawdry. A secret process of gilding is employed, 
a process learned from the Tartars, it is said. The 
natives guard it jealously. In the same manner do the 
makers of ikons guard their secret in the Government 
of Vladimir, which furnishes practically all the ikons 
in Russia. A special process of mixing and grinding 
the paints to produce a glossy finish has been discov- 
: ered. The natives draw and paint the religious figures 
after patterns handed down through generations. Few 
of them know the first elements of drawing, though 
their work lacks nothing in artistic effect. As in the 
making of spoons, the manufacturing of ikons employs 
several artels. 

"Everywhere in the bazaars you see native pottery. 
To be sure, it is crude, but it has many redeeming ele- 
ments, mainly its beauty of line and its durability. 
Poltava and Viatka are the centers for the industry; 
there some 30,000 peasants are employed, with an out- 
put valued at $150,000. The workers' wages range 
from twenty-five roubles ($12.50) to $100 a year. 
The making of locks is practically a monopoly of the 
kustarny. Pavlovo is the center. The wages rarely go 
above $2 a week. 

"The women play a great part in this work. Rus- 
sian women of all classes are good housewives. They 
are constantly employed in sewing, embroidering and 
in some instances weaving. This is particularly true 
of the peasant housewives. In their hands the weaving 
industry has become a business of first importance. 
When they do not work in the home, they meet in 
the community workshop or svieteika. The best linen 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 159 

comes from Jaroslav, Kostroma, Moscow and Vladi- 
mir, where fully 60,000 families find employment. 
The wages are fifty copecks — twenty-five cents — a day. 
The peasant women of Vladimir make a specialty of 
embroidering aprons, towels and table linen. At one 
time lacemaking was a thriving industry, but of late 
it has fallen into decay. The making of shawls and 
scarfs, limited to the Government of Orenburg, has 
shown a decided increase. The output is valued at 
$75,000 annually. 

"But you can see by these figures what I meant in 
saying that the kustarny thrive. They average an 
annual total turnover of $400,000,000. Many of 
these peasant workers live miles from the railroad and 
centers of civilization, most of them are underpaid and 
exploited by wily middlemen, and still the work is 
increasing yearly. And it will increase so long as the 
peasant in Russia maintains his singular position in the 
social scale. Once he has learned the ways of what 
we term urban civilization, much of his artistic and 
handicraft ability will be lost." 

We rose to go. We had long overstayed the limits 
of a call, even a call paid to a Russian banker, and 
we now hurried to the offices of an American harvester 
company, whose representative had invited us to lunch- 
eon. We found him in the yard talking busily to a 
group of men. They were all respectably dressed. 
Some had fur coats and hats, though all wore high 
boots. One or two wore white collars and cravats. 
They were examining a harvester of the latest type 
with the name of an Illinois firm painted on its side, 
while the agent was showing them how it worked and 
answering their questions. 



160 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

When they had gone he came in, "Not a bad morn- 
ing's work," he said, throwing of! his coat. "They 
bought two, and I'll get 'em to take another if they 
don't look out. They've plenty of money." 

"Looked prosperous enough," we observed. 

"Why, I guess that artel has several thousand in the 
bank." 

"Was that an artel?" 

"Surely, that's the way they get it." He smiled. 
"Cooperation, my boy, cooperation. . . ." 

ii 

The cooperative movement in Russia indicates one 
respect in which that country leads the world. So un- 
precedented has been the growth in the past twenty 
years that fully one-third of the population of Russia 
to-day is concerned either directly or indirectly with 
the movement. In this Russia is even further in ad- 
vance than Germany, which means that, sociologically 
speaking, she is a very great distance ahead of the 
United States. 

The proverbial inch of statistics will here go farther 
than a mile of explanation. The various cooperative 
societies in Russia now number over 37,000, of which 
15,000 are credit, loan and savings societies, 11,000 
consumers' leagues, 10,000 agricultural associations 
and 1,000 companies of artisans. The loan societies 
have over 9,000,000 members, the consumers' leagues, 
1,500,000, and the agricultural associations, 1,000,000. 

Turn to the United States and seek a parallel. Our 
only agricultural combinations are certain groups of 
fruit growers in the West who have combined for the 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 161 

marketing of their crops. 1 There is sporadic talk among 
more advanced and socialistic farmers about forming 
cooperative associations; and of course we have the 
grange, which in many districts is striving to be some- 
thing more than a social organization for the purpose 
of saving the rural populace from extinction by ennui. 
We also have building and loan associations, and in 
the recent establishment of rural credit banks there 
is a suggestion of cooperation. Further than that we 
have not advanced. Our consumers' leagues, while 
doing noble work in the betterment of factory condi- 
tions, cannot be said to have yet become a vital element 
in the nation or in any one city. 

Now conceive, if you can, New York City meeting 
the enforced high cost of living (enforced through 
manipulation) by giving the local branch of the Con- 
sumers' League a cash credit and directing it to buy 
butter, eggs, meat, bread, etc., for the populace. And 
conceive a great number of the people of New York 
belonging to the Consumers' League and making their 
purchases of provisions through that organization and 
from the society's stores supported by such purchases. 
It reads like the dream of a rabid socialist, a mad 
Utopia ! 

Yet this is exactly what the city Government of 
Petrograd did during 1916. Speculators had pushed 
the cost of living out of the reach of thousands of 
the people. The city fathers turned to the Consumers' 
League, gave it a credit of $25,000 to help initiate the 
operation, and made it responsible for furnishing food- 
stuffs. . . . Lunn, the socialist mayor of Schenectady, 

1 Compare this with but one item. Of the butter exported annually 
from Siberia — the "West" of Russia — 70% is produced by cooperative 
creameries. 



162 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

New York, tried a similar movement during a coal 
famine in his administration — and the good folks of 
that city have not yet ceased being scandalized by the 
memory of it ! 

The Russian artisan and the Russian farmer may be 
sadly ignorant of modern methods, but as cooperative 
workers they bear the torch for the rest of the world. 
Go into any walk of life you choose, and you will dis- 
cover cooperation. The old starosta of the Amur Trakt 
was right; his fellows can be found anywhere from 
Vilna to Vladivostok. Due to their cooperation Russia 
possesses a better rural credit system than the United 
States, for example. 

In many instances our Western farmers and ranchers 
are financed by Wall Street and they must agree to the 
exorbitant interest demanded by the local banks repre- 
senting New York institutions. So serious has the 
condition grown that, when Congress recently made 
an investigation of the number and state of tenant 
farmers in the country, it was deemed unwise to print 
the results ; nor will investigators find those figures open 
to public inspection at Washington. 

Singularly enough, the Russian Government deserves 
a major share of praise for the success of the credit in- 
stitutions. "The financial help given by our Treas- 
ury," says Prof. Totomianz of Moscow University, 1 
"to the Credit cooperatives, Loan and Savings Associa- 
tions, the Zemstvos' Banks and Cooperative Unions 
reached on July 15, 1915, the sum of 321,500,000 
roubles of which 52 millions are loans contributed to 
the capital stock, and the rest, short-term loans. The 
war had not interfered with the assistance which is ren- 

% The Russian Review, September, 1916. 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 163 

dered to Credit Societies by a special 'Department 
of Cooperation,' so to speak, that is, by the Board of 
Small Credit. From July, 1914, to April 5, 1915, 
the number of credit societies increased by 689. Be- 
sides, the Board has recently permitted the local com- 
mittees of the branches of the State Bank to give credit 
to all types of cooperative institutions. 

"But while rendering a tremendous material assist- 
ance to Credit Cooperation, our government at the same 
time does not encourage the growth of Statute-regu- 
lated Cooperative Unions. We have no more than 
31 Unions of Cooperative organizations. In view of 
the fact that the statutes of many Unions have failed 
to be legally approved, and because of the absence 
of a harmonious cooperative legislation, it has been 
noticed that in the second half of the year 1914 about 
100 new unions of cooperatives of various types were 
established on the basis of notarial contracts. These 
Contract Unions usually combine cooperative institu- 
tions of various types, but, unfortunately, they cannot 
extend to a great number of cooperative organizations. 

"Generally speaking, close and consorted collabora- 
tion of the cooperative institutions of all types is a 
characteristic trait of the Russian cooperative move- 
ment, by which it is advantageously distinguished from 
cooperation in some other countries. In many sections 
of the Empire, Credit Societies, the 'spring of coopera- 
tion,' lend material assistance to consumers' leagues, 
workmen's associations, agricultural societies and com- 
panies. As a rule, prohibition of credit sales is stipu- 
lated as a condition. Furthermore, owing to the as- 
sistance of credit cooperation, companies of artisans 



164 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

for the supply of munitions have recently begun to 
organize. 

"In addition to State help given to credit coopera- 
tives and the aid lent by the latter to other forms of 
cooperation, the Zemstvos also come to the assistance 
of the cooperative movement. This is done mainly 
through the Zemstvos' Banks of Small Credit, which 
are a peculiarity of Russia in the domain of social con- 
structive work. Up to July 1, 1914, 215 of these 
Zemstvos credit associations lent about 42,000,000 
roubles to credit cooperatives alone, this sum being 
contributed to their circulating capital, as well as to 
their capital stock. Many of these Banks are now 
granting credit to all other forms of cooperation. 
Sometimes the assistance assumes a very original form. 
For example, the Novgorod Bank of Small Credit gives 
credit to eighty Consumers' Leagues of its district on 
security of their goods, and places orders for oats, 
sugar, and flour with the Petrograd Society of Whole- 
sale Operations, that is, the Union of Consumers' 
Leagues. In Siberia the city administrations of Minu- 
sinsk and Kansk became shareholders in the local Con- 
sumers' League. The Kansk administration took 
twenty shares and, besides, decided to give over the 
government alimentary loan of 20,000 roubles to the 
Consumers' League. The city administration of Omsk 
has put free premises at the disposal of the local Con- 
sumers' League." 

in 

As was observed before, Russia is an agricultural 
nation and in considering the Russian as a working 
man, the bulk of one's attention necessarily is claimed 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 165 

by the rural workers. Agriculture employs 74.6% 
of the workers; industry, 9.6%; commerce, 3.8%; 
railways and river traffic, 1.6% ; the State, 1.4% ; and 
private employment, 4.6%. In addition there are the 
unattached bands of workers. 

It will be recalled that serfdom was partly brought 
into existence by the incurable migratory habit of the 
agricultural laborers. The habit persists to this day. 
The Russian farmer and artisan alike refuse to stay 
put. The fact that an appreciable number of the peo- 
ple constantly go about from place to place either in 
pilgrim bands or working companies is a situation Rus- 
sian economic life has to reckon with. Each summer, 
to quote one instance, over a million farmers migrate 
to the wheat fields of the south. Each winter hordes 
of them drift into the cities. Due to this migratory 
habit, the efforts of the Government to colonize Siberia 
have met with enormous success. Overcrowding in 
some districts has given the peasant a restless foot, lack 
of work accounts for some of the unrest, and these and 
the lack of an inclination to work have bred the hosts 
of beggars and tramps that infest the countryside and 
city. 

The beggardom of Moscow, Russia's largest indus- 
trial center, is a whole study in itself. Factory work- 
ers are factory workers the world over — slaves to ma- 
chines. Farmers may differ — but the peasant classes 
have traits in common the world over. It is in her 
beggars, the outcasts of her workaday life, that Russia 
stands supreme. 

Come with me, then, to the Kremlin, to the doss 
house, to the Khirov Rinok where you can see the real 
Russian tramp and beggar and sans-coulettes. 



166 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

IV 

The beggars are leaving the Kremlin for the night. 
From the towers of the score-odd churches, the boom 
and hum of the last evening bell dies away. The dusk 
becomes heavy with silence. A sudden sharp command 
from a sentry. The word is passed along. A beggar 
or two drifts onto the broad pavement that leads down 
to the south gate of the holy fortress. A handful of 
them creep out of the corners where they have been 
hiding from the cruel wind. Still another band shuf- 
fles out of the enclosure by the barracks. The pave- 
ment is filled with a crowd of jostling, singing, groan- 
ing, laughing masses of filth and rags, of withered 
arms and blinded eyes. Most of them barely crawl 
along. A few, however, move briskly through the fine 
snow; the day has gone well with them. They link 
arms. 

"Whither, Ivan?" 

And Ivan grins as he murmurs, "Doss." Which 
means that he has begged money enough to buy a sup- 
per of vodka and black bread and hash at a "doss" 
house, one of the underground restaurants of Moscow. 

There are 50,000 beggars in Moscow, and the beggar 
rank and file by no means constitutes the majority of 
the city's submerged tenth. So when you follow the 
beggars from the Kremlin to the door of one of their 
"doss" houses, you will find already a large crowd 
ahead. The ubiquitous gendarme makes a vain attempt 
to herd the men and women into line. He curses and 
prods them with his fist. Finally the crowd straightens 
out. Slowly it begins to move — a serpent gliding into 
a sewer. Another gendarme scrutinizes you at the door. 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 167 

You are shabbily dressed, so he says nothing. Down 
into the sewer you go. 

It is a large cellar set with long wooden tables and 
rows of backless benches stretching the entire length 
of the room. At one end a counter where you buy 
your bread, tea, raw fish or beer — or even what were 
clothes, old trousers and shirts, if you are rich enough. 
Soup is served in bowls at a copeck a bowl. An enor- 
mous chunk of black bread the size of our loaf costs 
only three copecks. "Bread" is a misnomer, for there 
is little enough flour in it. Your supper purchased, you 
juggle it to the table, where you scramble for a place 
among the shoving mob. 

The room is dark. Only two little lights hung on 
opposite walls struggle feebly to dispel the darkness. 
The floor is black and slippery from the melted snow 
and boot slime of a thousand nights and days. There 
is much chatter and chaffing. Someone steals a piece 
of his neighbor's bread and essays to fight, but as a 
fight means the police, and the "doss" is warm, the 
others order a truce so that everyone can stay in until 
the final closing hour. The beggar is a cunning fellow. 

In these dark, miasmic holes are fed hundreds of the 
poor each night. Some sleep there, but the majority 
drift out when the hour grows late. For there is more 
to the Russian beggar's life than panhandling, eating 
and sleeping ; he is an integral part of the underground 
world, and each night he goes to the place where for- 
gather the pickpockets, criminals, porters, cab-drivers 
and all the other people of the abyss. 

Until you have crossed the frontiers of Russia you 
do not know what beggars are. Beside them the dere- 
licts of a Bowery bread-line or the tatterdemalion 



168 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

vagrants of the Thames Embankment are Beau Brum- 
mels in dress, Bostonians in culture. The Russian beg- 
gar — and you see him at his best in Russia's most Rus- 
sian city, Moscow — is the Super-Beggar. In him con- 
verge all the ages of mendicancy; he wears the rags 
of a caveman, has the piety of a medieval pilgrim and 
the cunning of a modern panhandler. He is the product 
of his own laziness and disease, and of his fellow-coun- 
trymen's belief in the efficacy of works of supereroga- 
tion — to pass a beggar unheeded in Holy Russia is to 
endanger one's soul. Besides, according to popular 
belief, the excesses of an all-night racket during which 
you have dropped hundreds of roubles into the purse 
of a restaurateur can readily be expiated by dropping 
a ten-copeck piece into the palm of a beggar the next 
day. 

If you fail to contribute, he will pour maledictions 
on your head as readily as blessings. The Russians 
know this, and they give him scant opportunity to abuse 
them. The shopkeeper does not wave him out of his 
store, he merely opens the cash drawer and hands the 
beggar his dole. The beggar crosses himself before the 
ikon — every shop, theater and office in Russia has an 
ikon — and goes out. It is a business transaction pure 
and simple. Sometimes he may have a charity box 
and a testimonial to the effect that he is a good man, 
or that this and that calamity have befallen him; but 
in the majority of cases he has nothing more than his 
rags and infirmities as guarantees to assure you he is 
worthy of charity. 

The Mecca of the Russian beggar is the Kremlin at 
Moscow. Saunter past the little chapel of Our Lady 
of Iberia, which stands at the gate of the plaza — a 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 169 

white and gold chapel with a stream of the devout 
ever coming and going. On its steps sit and lounge a 
motley of beggars, the first of the religious crew. Once 
within the gate, the "Red Square" opens out. Ahead, 
St. Basil's, a gigantic sea-anemone of architecture, an 
Oriental jumble of vari-colored minarets and bulbous, 
blue domes topped by gilded, three-armed crosses. On 
the one hand, the shops of the famous Moscow arcade ; 
on the other, the turreted walls of the Kremlin itself. 

Over its crumbling ramparts tower the shafts and 
spires of the churches. At the "Redeemer's Gate" the 
wall is broken, showing a glimpse of the glittering 
buildings within. If you are a Russian you will raise 
your hat, as you pass through, to the ikon enshrined 
in the tower above ; if you are a foreigner and do not, 
a beggar lout may have knocked it off before you 
emerge from the tunnel. This is one of the preroga- 
tives of the Kremlin beggar, though he may not al- 
ways avail himself of it. At all events, be your hat off 
or on, he will approach with his hand extended. 

Once within the Kremlin walls, your gaze fixes on 
splashes of reds and whites, greens and golds, blues and 
yellows. Even the barracks are white, and the bar- 
racks are a necessary adjunct, as the Kremlin is a 
fortress. Every man in its garrison wears the Cross 
of St. George for valor. When the sentry turns away 
at the end of his beat, a beggar rushes out at you from 
the shadow of the wall. 

Scattered here and there are monuments marking 
events in the bloody history of Russia. There is the 
famous Chinese cannon: a huge piece of ancient ord- 
nance, with bronze serpents that wriggle and twist 
along the barrel. A beggar woman squats to the lee 



170 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

of it. Nearby is the largest bell in the world, so the 
Russians claim. Cracked and long since voiceless, it 
now rests on a masonry foundation. As you approach 
a shoal of hands clutch at you — dirty hands, palsied 
hands, hands minus many fingers, amorphous claws, 
hands of little children, hands of old men, hands of 
decrepit women ; some are not hands at all, only shriv- 
eled stumps. 

Like their brothers in other lands, the Russian clerics 
know the benefits and evils of the beggar. They openly 
encourage him to hang around church doors as an ever- 
present appeal for charity, that the faithful may never 
lack the opportunity to carry out the scriptural injunc- 
tion about the poor. At the same time, however, they 
are frank in warning visitors against the beggar's pil- 
fering habits. At the entrance of St. Basil's is a large 
sign : "Beware of Pickpockets !" 

As you spell out the words, the beggars leer at you. 
Inside the grotto chapel can always be found a congre- 
gation of men, old women, school girls in their "gym- 
nasium" uniforms, soldiers, and more beggars. The 
Kremlin beggar, you see, believes that his power as such 
is enhanced if every now and again he slips into the 
chapel. So in he shuffles, prostrates himself, crosses 
himself, and looks the crowd over. If he sees that most 
of the worshipers have read the sign and are keeping 
their hands near their wallets, he will dive out into the 
sunlight once more; but should the congregation seem 
engrossed in their devotions he will stay awhile, mov- 
ing now and again from spot to spot in the little, 
crowded room, always prostating himself, crossing 
himself, muttering prayers, and plying his light-fin- 
gered trade. 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 171 

Possibly the only place in the entire Kremlin where 
you can be free of the beggar is a spot on the ramparts 
of the south wall. The view from there is one of the 
boasts of Moscow. Oil the palm of the guard and 
access to the steps is easy. Far above the city the 
Kremlin turrets rear their heads. Below is the town, 
its plains of flat roof-tops broken here and there where 
a swelling dome or a golden minaret crops up like a 
tree on a wind-swept steppe. The Moscova winds a 
serpentine course through the city. A few barges, 
drawn up to a wharf for the winter, look like mere 
skiffs. Behind on the ramparts paces a sentry. Above 
and around the towers of the Kremlin churches the 
crows circle and dip. Suddenly into the hush, the 
boom of a bell. Other bells of the Kremlin take it 
up. Thunder and crash, tinkle and rattle, they ring 
out the Angelus. Their sound reaches the city. The 
bells of Moscow's two hundred and thirty-two churches 
answer. For five minutes the towers rock. The city 
is one great cacophony. Then peace settles down once 
more. The sentry approaches : "You must leave; the 
gates are about to close." 

For five minutes you have missed the haunting whine 
of the beggars. Once more on the pavement below, 
however, you are in their midst as they wend their way 
to the city for the night, out to the "doss" houses and 
the Khirov Rinok. 

In beggardom the Khirov Rinok, or the lodging- 
house of the poor, is dubbed the "Flea Market," for 
reasons which need no explanation. In summer the 
beggars sleep out of doors, crawling under the shelter 
of buildings, sleeping under the stalls in the fish market, 
or on the benches along the bank of the Moscova. In 



172 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

the winter when even the most sheltered corner is swept 
by a pitiless blast, sleeping out of doors spells death. 
So the beggars, having eaten at a "doss" house, shuffle 
over to the "Flea Market," where clot the pickpockets, 
the criminals and the birds of passage. 

It is a drab quadrangle. A collection of hovels. 
The windows are grimy. Broken panes are stuffed 
with bunches of straw and old rags. Under an archway 
leading into the court are gathered a group of wretches 
who eye you dully. Ranged along the curb, a line of 
rickety cabs without drivers or hitching-posts — none 
are needed ! 

Pick your way along the broken plank walk. The 
first door contrasts sharply with the other corners of 
the place. Through the window can be caught a 
glimpse of a white interior, a white bed, a white-robed 
nurse — the hospital. Russia is given to paradoxes. In 
the worst of hovels you will always find an ikon corner 
clean and orderly. In the midst of the poverty and 
filth of a city you will discover a hospital. When emi- 
grants are sent out to Siberia, the cars are mere cattle 
pens on wheels. But the train invariably carries a hos- 
pital coach, with a nurse and doctor in attendance. 
The hospital at the "Flea Market" is a necessary ad- 
junct. Cholera, typhus and typhoid breed here, and 
scarcely a day passes without a death. With charac- 
teristic lack of logic, the authorities do not dream of 
cleaning out the hole and preventing the spread of dis- 
ease; instead, they erect a hospital into which poor 
wretches may crawl and die. 

Across the quadrangle is the main building. As you 
fling back the door, you stumble over the bodies of 
snoring men. Were they not snoring you would have 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 173 

taken them for bundles of rags. A murk of vile air 
strikes your nostrils. Darkness is thick within. On 
two sides of the large room ranges a row of broad 
benches, planks set on trestles a yard above the floor. 
On them, closely packed as sardines in a box, lie sleep- 
ing men and women. Those who cannot sleep sit in 
little groups on the edge of the benches and talk in 
guttural undertones. A tiny candle, flickering in a 
sconce at each end of the room, scarcely illuminates 
the faces enough for recognition. 

One of the men on the bench idly kicks his feet. A 
grunt. Beneath his feet lies a man curled up on the 
slime of the floor. Beside him are shadows of other 
forms. Lift one of the planks, and below is another 
layer. There they lie, without bedding save a handful 
of straw, without covering save their rags, without air 
save such as sifts down to them when the door opens. 
"They've had hard luck," the man who kicks his feet 
volunteers. "They can't afford to sleep up here with 
us. This top row costs six copecks. The bottom only 
costs five." 

All ages of men and women are here, all sizes, all 
nationalities that recognize the Russian flag, all re- 
ligions, all degrees of poverty and degeneration and 
disease. The cab drivers and market porters, who make 
the staggering sum of $4 a month, are the aristocrats 
of the crowd. Not only an aristocracy of wealth, but 
an aristocracy of power, for they are in league with 
the criminals. They "fix it up" with the thugs to take 
an unsuspecting charge to a dark hole where the thief 
can do his work. And the Russian thug, like his beg- 
gar brother, is a Super-Thug. He is a simple fellow 
and he likes direct means. A noose on a stick he throws 



174 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

over the head of the passer-by. A jerk — and stunned, 
or with neck broken, the wayfarer tumbles to the pave- 
ment and his pockets are rifled. In more favored climes 
a thief will not kill you if you give him your watch; 
in Russia he kills you first and then looks to see if 
you have a watch. So here in the "Flea Market" the 
cab drivers and the thugs meet to arrange their appoint- 
ments and divide the swag. 

Passing among the groups that sit yawning on the 
edge of the benches comes a porter. From beneath his 
rough, padded coat he produces a bunch of radishes, 
or a chunk of black bread, and now and again a bottle 
of vodka. He has stolen them from a booth and brings 
them to the lodging-house of the poor to sell. A clever 
porter can make as much as fifty copecks a night from 
his stealings. Besides the edibles, he often brings in 
old scraps of things that the booth keepers have thrown 
away as useless. Here is a lout with a handful of 
disks of tarnished tin. The moujik mirror is tin, but 
when it rusts the shopkeeper is forced to throw it on 
the ash heap. Then the porter finds it, and sells it 
in the beggar's lodging-house for a dish ! 

In a corner of the room an old man tends a pot of 
hash that steams over a charcoal stove. For a copeck 
you can buy a dab of this hash served on a newspaper, 
or, if you are rich enough to buy one of the tarnished 
mirrors from the porter, on your improvised plate. 

All night long these bargainings go on. Men sell 
and swap their clothes, their little treasures, their food. 
The junk from half a hundred ash piles is pawed over 
and bartered in this lodging-house. 

Few indeed of the lodgers have anything in the shape 
of a newspaper or a book. Few indeed are those 



THE RUSSIAN AS A WORKING MAN 175 

who can read ; one person in five is the ratio in Russia. 
Neither can they write. The men of any education 
who are down and out and who come to these lodgings 
are so few and far between as to be indistinguishable 
from the mass. 

Though the police watch the place with untiring 
scrutiny, they rarely come inside except to look for 
some desperate character, or for a thug who has in- 
flicted violence on one of them and who is known to 
be an habitue of the "Flea Market." With little cere- 
mony they rush into the hall, turn over the slumbering 
forms with their boot toes, cross-question, threaten, and 
then pass on to the next row of sleepers. Spies have 
been known to frequent the lodging-house of the poor, 
though only as a last resort. 

The Russian Jew is totally absent, for with charac- 
teristic charity the Jew takes care of his own poor. 
Few of the men in this place can be said to have 
"fallen." They have never been up — witless fellows, 
mere riffraff that drift in here for the night or part of 
the night. 

There are many peasants on the sleeping-benches. 
They have left their farms to find work in the city 
and, finding only poverty instead, have dropped to 
this level. Many of them, unaccustomed to the city 
life, fall sick — and the little hospital at the corner is 
kept busy. 

Thief, thug and cab driver, porter and beggar, peas- 
ant and spy rest side by side on the sleeping-benches 
and on the floor. Over them swarm vermin. The air 
they breathe is thick with bad tobacco smoke, the reek- 
ing odor of wet clothes and boots and the accumulated 
filth of months. . . . 



176 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

On the wall above the door hangs a little red light 
that throws a faint glow over what seems to be a dab 
of tarnished brass and smoke-blackened colors. Step 
closer and you see it is an ikon of the Christ, with His 
hand raised, blessing the miasmic mob of His children. 



CHAPTER IX 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND SOME OTHERS 



SHE was a lady, a regular literary lady, and she 
spoke with the air of one who does not judge 
books without first reading them. 

"But this Dostoevsky — he leaves me feeling like a 
jellied mass of gloom. I find nothing interesting in 
him and much that is repellent. Why do the literati 
rage so furiously about him'? Gloom, gloom and more 
gloom! His novels are without form and void!" 

All of which, frankly, expresses the feeling many 
average readers have about Dostoevsky, the greatest 
writer Russia has produced. He is either uninterest- 
ing or gloomy or both. 

The former objection may have sound basis. 
Dostoevsky seems never to have been convinced of 
the necessity for following the contemporary conven- 
tional form in novel construction. He cannot be said 
to have copied the style of any one master. A man 
singularly devoid of the influence of any printed word, 
save that of the Gospels, his style reflects but one thing 
— his own nervous, visionary temperament. Moreover, 
he came before the day when Russian literature was to 
depend for its effectiveness and individuality upon un- 
usual form, upon a succession of brilliant episodes, 

177 



178 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

anecdotes and disjointed phrases set between rows of 
asterisks and ranks of dots. Dostoevsky was not a 
jeweler turning out unusual types of filigreed punctua- 
tion that one can pick up and examine in the hand as 
he would a brooch or a ring; rather, Dostoevsky was a 
weaver of great tapestries, a painfully conscientious 
craftsman. One must view his novels en masse, must 
"stand off" to appreciate the fullness and depth of their 
literary chiaroscuro. 

To call him gloomy is a misnomer. One must em- 
ploy other standards of judgment than those created 
by Dostoevsky' s own peculiar native literature. Com- 
pared with contemporary standards in America, he is 
gloomy ; viewed as a product of Russian life, he is not. 
It were wiser first to study the Russ soul. After that 
some semblance of definitive light and shade will 
emerge from the apparent murk of realism. 

In addition, such study of the Russ soul will throw 
into striking contrast other Russian authors who are 
generally regarded true sons of the race. It will show 
Turgenev to have had a European soul under his Slav 
exterior; to have been a remarkable painter of word 
landscapes who wrote of an age long since dead 
albeit he thought it still alive; and these things Tur- 
genev's life and work prove. If will show Tolstoy a 
mingling of East and West, a veritable battleground 
on which they fought for dominion; this also is shown 
in Tolstoy's life and works. Of the three, Dostoevsky 
most closely approaches an epitome of the Russ soul, 
which is the genius of the masses. 

Again, we are apt to judge Russian literature in 
terms of the Continental influences which were brought 
to bear upon it during the past two hundred years. 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND OTHERS 179 

There was the Classical School, the Romantic, the 
Natural — merely Slav reflections of what was being 
written in Europe at the time. When Dostoevsky 
arrived at notice he baffled his European critics because 
he did not altogether fit into any of the categories the 
European schools had produced. A boyish interest in 
Balzac, Goethe, Schiller, Byron and Racine passed 
away with adolescence. Epitomizing Russia, he stood 
alone. Hailed as great, he still was not wholly under- 
stood, for the Russian soul at the time was generally 
misinterpreted and, until Dostoevsky portrayed it in 
his novels, was but slightly known even to the Russ 
himself. 

To reduce to a few denning words the spiritual char- 
acteristics of a people so paradoxical as the Slav is 
indeed a difficult task. I have attempted it elsewhere 
in the course of these pages. There are many cross pur- 
poses and spiritual "sports" breaking here and there 
that defy tracing. It can be reduced, however, to this 
basis; it has the rugged faith of old age and the re- 
bellious ardor of youth. These two elements, found 
in Dostoevsky's life are, in turn, reflected in his works. 

Few men have felt more acutely than Dostoevsky 
the high cost of writing. Few men paid for their writ- 
ings so high a price in living and few turned to such 
good and direct account their investments in actual ex- 
perience. The man who projects himself into the 
moods of a character may produce a faithful portrait, 
but his work will lack the ultimate depth and finesse 
of reality. He who has been born and lived with these 
moods stands better equipped to portray them in their 
just proportions. The one sketches a picture; the other 
keeps a diary. 



180 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Therein lies a fundamental definition of Dostoev- 
sky's works ; his novels are diaries. Poor Folk, the first 
novel, is a diary of the surroundings of his early life, 
for, although of the hereditary nobility, he was born 
in a workhouse and his family of nine lived in two 
rooms for the first ten years of his life, with poor 
folk such as Makar Djevuschkin about on all sides. 
Insult and Injury is equally a diary of the Siberian ex- 
periences. Of the other novels, no two works could 
be more striking examples of empirical authorship than 
The Gambler and The Brothers Karamazov, represent- 
ing, as they do respectively, Dostoevsky's gambling in 
middle life at European spas and his struggle for the 
ideal man. 

In a measure, this writing from personal experience 
may seem the easiest possible metier. Certainly it is 
the one chosen by the wise novice, for to write about 
the things one knows intimately and has experienced 
is the fundamental canon in writing. But there are 
experiences and experiences, knowledge and knowledge. 
There are the physical adventures — the wild encoun- 
ters, the quick turns of luck, the intensifying culmina- 
tion of anecdotes which, set down with color and sus- 
pense, make capital reading for certain moods and states 
of mind. There are also spiritual adventures, and to re- 
count these requires a pen more delicately adjusted 
and an eye more keen. 

Dostoevsky would have been a spiritual adventurist 
had he never left his dooryard, had he never been con- 
demned to death, exiled to Siberia, staggered under 
debt and physical torture all his life. From these 
physical actualities he extracted their spiritual realities. 
In portraying them he was paramount, which made him 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND OTHERS 181 

in his writings preeminently a Russ. These two are 
contained in each other; that is, however deeply the 
physical aspects of life may move him, the Russ is 
stirred to greater depths by their spiritual reactions. 
It is, indeed, impossible to consider the Russian soul 
apart from spiritual metabolism, apart from a clash 
between the rebellious ardor of youth and the sturdy 
faith of old age. 

Sturdy faith is attained not alone by having it 
moulded into a philosophy of life in youth, or by ac- 
cepting it as a matter of course, as it may be in the 
case of illiterates, but by having it put to the test in 
life, by having battled for its existence in one's philoso- 
phy. The predominance of Orthodox dogma in the 
Russian's religion is, in the majority of cases, due to 
early training and to acceptance, since fully 60% 
of the people are illiterate. Rut in many instances 
it is due to the fact that it has proven invaluable to 
men's lives. Dostoevsky was one of these cases. The 
story is written in his life. He discovers the Rible, 
for instance, not in a period of adolescent religiosity, 
but in the confinement of Peter and Paul Fortress. 
Writing to his brother Michael from his cell, he asks 
for some books: "But best of all would be a Bible 
(both Testaments). I need one." He was then aged 
twenty-seven. Five years later from Omsk, after his 
term of exile, he writes his creed : "Because I myself 
have learned it and gone through it, I want to say to 
you that in such moments (i. e., times of suffering) 
one does, 'like dry grass,' thirst after faith, and that one 
finds it in the end solely and simply because one sees 
the truth more clearly when one is unhappy. I want 
to say to you about myself, that I am a child of this 



182 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

age, a child of unfaith and skepticism, and probably 
(indeed, I know it) shall remain so to the end of 
my life. How dreadfully has it tormented me (and 
torments me now) — this longing for faith, which is 
all the stronger for the proofs I have against it. And 
yet God gives me sometimes moments of perfect peace ; 
in such moments I have formulated my creed, wherein 
all is clear and holy to me. This creed is extremely 
simple ; here it is : I believe that there is nothing love- 
lier, deeper, more sympathetic, more rational, more 
manly and more perfect than the Saviour. I say to 
myself with jealous love that not only is there no 
one else like Him, but that there could be no one else. 
I would even say more: If any one could prove to 
me that Christ is outside the truth, and if truth really 
did exclude Christ, I should prefer to stay with Christ 
and not with truth." 

At fifty-six, despite the prophecy above, he writes 
to a mother who has sought his counsel : "Your child 
is now eight years old; make him acquainted with 
the Gospel, teach him to believe in God, and that in 
the most orthodox fashion. This is a sine .qua non; 
otherwise you can't make a fine human being out of 
your child, but at best a sufferer, and at worst a care- 
less, lethargic 'success,' which is a still more deplorable 
fate. You will never find anything better than the 
Savior anywhere, believe me." 

Evidently Dostoevsky's faith did not come easily. 
He had to battle for it. Once established, it burned 
with a steady flame. It was a live thing, an intense, 
intimate, acute reality, placing its mark upon every 
page of his work. 

And therein lies the difference between the school 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND. OTHERS 183 

of realism of which Dostoevsky is the unquestioned 
leader, and every other school. For there is a realism 
of the flesh and a realism of the spirit, and the greater 
realities are spiritual realities. That is why the realism 
of Dostoevsky is so much more vital than the realism — 
say of our American Dreiser. Raskolnikov, hero of 
Crime and Punishment, hounded down to the relief 
of confession by the growing realization of his sin, is 
a more important study of man than Eugene Whitla, 
hero of The Genius, who is hounded into a sickly de- 
cency by his inability to succeed with the opposite 
course. One man is a conqueror, the other a "careless, 
lethargic 'success.' " The one is a study in spiritual 
realism, the other a study in fleshly realism. 

It is this element of spiritual realism that the lady 
who was perfectly literary, and many others, mistake 
for gloom. True, there are the dark realities of filth, 
poverty, lust, suicide, hunger, but they are the fight- 
ing elements of the spiritual battle, the brilliant con- 
test of spiritual realities against the sham realities of 
the flesh. One can see the struggle, just as through 
the gray-massed storm clouds he sees the brilliant flash 
and glow of lightning. 

Dostoevsky's characters are studies in spiritual 
metabolism. They are Russian. They are also in- 
tensely human. To dismiss them as merely patients 
from a psychopathic ward is to disregard the presence 
of the spiritual struggle in man. 

Consider his characters one by one through all the 
twenty-one works, and the rule holds. They are strong 
or weak literary representations of men and women 
just in that proportion in which that battle between 
flesh and spirit is depicted in them. Makar Djevusch- 



184 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

kin of Poor Folk, the old saint in The Idiot, Raskol- 
nikov of Crime and Punishment, Ilioscha Karamazov 
of The Brothers Karamazov — these and many another 
are all folk who resist classification according to nerve 
disorders. They are crystallized cross-sections of the 
Russ soul. By creating them Dostoevsky became the 
Russian apostle of spiritual realism, of spiritual action. 

Here are his words for it. He is writing about the 
novel that later was produced under the title of The 
Brothers Karamazov. 

"I have my principal figure ready in my mind. A Rus- 
sian of our class, getting on in years, not particularly 
cultured, although not uncultured either, and of a cer- 
tain degree of social importance, quite suddenly, in 
ripe age, loses his belief in God. His whole life long 
he has been taken up wholly by work, has never 
dreamed of escaping from the rut, and, up to his forty- 
fifth year, has distinguished himself in no wise. (The 
working out will be purely psychological, profound 
in feeling, and thoroughly Russian.) The loss of faith 
has a colossal effect on him. He tries to attach him- 
self to the younger generation — the atheists, Slavs, 
Occidentalists, the Russian sects and anchorites, the 
mystics ; among others he comes across a Polish Jesuit ; 
thence he descends to the abyss of the Chlysty Sect; 
and finds at last salvation in Russian soil, the Russian 
Savior and the Russian God. . . . My dear friend, I 
have a totally different conception of truth and realism 
from that of our realists and critics. My God! If 
one could set down categorically all that we Russians 
have gone through during the past ten years in the 
way of spiritual development, all the realists would 
shriek that it was fantasy; and yet it would be pure 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND OTHERS 185 

realism! It is the one, true, deep realism. Theirs is 
altogether too superficial." 

11 

In one of his essays, Mr. Gilbert Chesterton observes, 
"It is the very soul of Russia, as it comes to us like a 
great wind from out of the lands of sunrise, that a 
weakness when confessed almost becomes a strength. 
Most of Russian fiction is a vast, anarchic confessional. 
It would seem as if the Russian lived not only in agri- 
cultural but psychological communes. One of our 
young novelists, who knows that country well, declared 
to me that a Russian starts an acquaintance by say- 
ing, T murdered my sister because her boots creaked. 
Such are my failings. We can now be friends.' This 
is a lively caricature, of course, but it is one of those 
that locates a truth." 

Mr. Chesterton's thought came to me forcibly as 
I approached another Russian that lends himself to 
definition. I cannot recall that in any of his works 
Tolstoy has a character acknowledging that he has mur- 
dered his sister because her boots creaked, but I do feel 
that both Tolstoy's life and his writings constitute a 
"vast, anarchic confessional." His strength lay in his 
very weakness ; his force in his oscillation. 

I have epitomized Tolstoy above as a clashing point 
between East and West, his life a battlefield on which 
the two elements fought for dominion. 

First we must understand what these two contend- 
ing elements were : The spirit of the East is passivity ; 
the spirit of the West is activity. The East holds to 
faith without works: the West to works. The East 



186 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

cultivates a quiescent dogma that leads to annihilation ; 
the West holds dogma to be worthless unless it can be 
converted into the dynamic ethics of everyday living. 

It is futile to study Tolstoy — or any author, for that 
matter — apart from the way he works spiritually. He 
may be quite unconscious of those forces' being at 
work; they are working, nevertheless. 

Tolstoy was all too aware of this activity within 
him; hence the constant disquietude of his life. In 
fact, so delicately adjusted was his mind and spirit that 
he veered with each new force. Eternally was he seek- 
ing Truth and Righteousness — the Absolute Beauty. 
Eternally was he a wanderer after them. Eternally 
did he oscillate because time and again was he disen- 
chanted. Not always did he go forward; often he 
doubled on his tracks. Now the East dragged at his 
footsteps ; now the West drove him on. He fled from 
one to the other. He fled from both. Finally, in utter 
despair, he tottered out to start on his pilgrimage. It 
was his last flight. It is said that he hoped to find 
haven in a monastery — the East in Russia. Instead, 
he found his resting place in the most Western thing 
Russia has developed ; he died beside the railway tracks 
in a little railroad station. 

Tolstoy's life reminds one of the action of a man 
who is locked in a room with many doors, who tries 
each door time and again. He was successively an aris- 
tocrat, born and bred to his station; a student, bowed 
down with the weight of the world's evils ; a brave sol- 
dier; a rising man of letters whom the intellectuals 
dined and flattered ; a lover of cafes and chantants and 
adventuresses ; an epicurean ; a happily married family 
man; a landed gentleman of means; a V Narodnist — 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND OTHERS 187 

he embraced the life of his peasants; a novelist who 
rebelled right and left against the State, the Church, 
the bourgeois conception of married life and whose 
literary self-assurance left him utterly impervious to 
criticism; a preacher and founder of a new religion 
(this was a reversion at the age of fifty to a scheme 
he had dreamed out as a university student at the age 
of eighteen); a delver into aesthetics; a dramatist of 
force ; a schoolteacher — the list is endless. 

What was behind it all ? or, as he himself expressed 
it, using Tchernyshevsky's title, "What Is To Be 
Done?' 

A man of constant activities, he was urged on to seek 
a way out — a reasoning, rational way out. Orthodoxy 
did not offer him the norm that it did to Dostoevsky, 
nor, for that matter, did any faith or shade of belief 
for any length of time. He was both passive and 
active, non-resistant and rebellious. The restlessness 
of the man's soul makes him one of the most tragic 
figures in the history of literature. Russia has had 
many Boyoiskately — seekers after God; most of them 
either fell back into the abyss of despair or floated into 
the snug haven of an ecclesiastical religion. But Tol- 
stoy eternally pressed forward; albeit he met with 
many a spiritual impasse. 

"What is to be done?' was answered in his life by 
his continuing to do something as rationally as he knew 
how, however contradictory it may have been to the 
thing he had been doing immediately previous or five 
years before. As his dictum ran, "Say something new, 
important and necessary to mankind" — and he said it 
as the state of his mind bade him say. 

He left his life an unfinished story. Each student 



188 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

may make up his own denouement to that story. Each 
after the manner of his own thought can answer the 
question of whither Tolstoy was bound when he left 
Yasnaya Polyana for the last time. Was he abandon- 
ing wife and family 4 ? Was he abandoning the peas- 
ants whose cause he had so nobly and tirelessly cham- 
pioned? Or was he following the call of the pilgrim- 
age — going on after the Absolute Beauty 1 ? 

Since the world has come to know Dostoevsky, Tol- 
stoy has lost some of his initial prestige. Whereas be- 
fore Tolstoy represented the great idealist of the Rus- 
sian masses, we are now discovering that Dostoevsky 
came closest to their line of vision. Tolstoy set about 
leading the moujik along a rational path. He met de- 
feat because the moujik is anything but a rational 
creature and because Russia refuses to be measured with 
the mental foot rule. His life and work represent only 
one phase of the Russian genus ; and of the two his life 
was greater than his writings. What he did was far 
more important than what he said. 

Dostoevsky was as much a seeker after Absolute 
Beauty as was Tolstoy, the difference being that 
Dostoevsky believed that he had found it. Here are 
his words: "All writers, not ours alone but foreigners 
also who have sought to represent the Absolute Beauty, 
were unequal to the task, for it is an infinitely difficult 
one. The beautiful is the ideal; but ideals with us, as 
in civilized Europe, have long been wavering. There 
is in the world only one figure of absolute beauty: 
Christ. That infinitely lovely figure is, as a matter 
of course, an infinite marvel (the whole Gospel of St. 
John is full of this thought: John sees the wonders 
of the Incarnation, the apparition of the Beautiful.)" 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND OTHERS 189 

And Dostoevsky held that the ultimate destiny of 
Russia was to hold up this vision of Absolute Beauty 
to the world's adoring. "Russia must reveal to the 
world her own Russian Christ, whom as yet the people 
know not. . . . There lies, as I believe, the inmost 
essence of our vast, impending contribution to civiliza- 
tion, whereby we shall awaken the European people; 
there lies the inmost core of our exuberant and intense 
existence that is to be." 

I am not sure but that in his heart of hearts Tolstoy 
held Russia's destiny to be somewhat the same — the 
manifestation of the Russian conception of Absolute 
Beauty to the world. Tolstoy visualized this Absolute 
Beauty after the fashion of a glorified peasant in a 
moujik's blouse and boots, his hands and feet pierced 
with the cruel nails of injustice. Dostoevsky saw Ab- 
solute Beauty as a radiant figure, glistering in cloth 
of gold, whose heart bled for very love of His children. 
Tolstoy worshiped with his brain and his brawn; 
Dostoevsky worshiped with his heart and on his knees. 
Of the two, Dostoevsky came closest to the moujik's 
viewpoint. 

in 

Perhaps no two men are more seemingly far apart 
than Lord Byron and Jack London: one the child of 
Romanticism and its foremost apostle; the other an 
apostle of brute force and brute Nature. 

In his day Byron was widely read and widely copied ; 
in the evolution of Russian literature the Romantic 
School constitutes an important stage. He may be said 
to have influenced the pens of Russians more than any 
one force exerted during the 19th Century. His popu- 



igo THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

larity was due to the fact that he struck a responsive 
chord in the Russian. 

We generally think of the German as the most senti- 
mental person in the world ; at least, he can be the most 
"mussy" sentimental person. Second to him is the 
Russ. Russian sentiment is tearful, pessimistic, self- 
pitying. At almost stated intervals must the Russian 
experience his troublous times. This is all part and 
parcel of a make-up which requires an occasional pur- 
gative podvig, an occasional religious debauch, to clear 
the spiritual man. In a word, the Russian keeps sane 
by periodically becoming insanely sentimental. Natu- 
rally, to such souls the romanticism of Byron appealed 
deeply. 

Between these "attacks," what*? — Jack Londonism! 

The favorite American or foreign author in Russia 
to-day is Jack London. All classes read him. Critics 
discuss and quarrel over him, and his books continue to 
sell ; you find them in the shops, on railway bookstalls 
and in the kiosks. He appeals to the exact opposite 
in the Russ that Byron appealed to. He quickens in 
them one thing they would possess ; he awakens a desire 
for physical activity. 

In Dostoevsky we found a man of spiritual activity. 
Tolstoy's life and works show a man of constant mental 
activity. The third author who is characteristically 
Russian is an apostle of physical activity. He is Jack 
London's Russian counterpart. I refer to Gorky. 

At first one usually regards Gorky as the author who 
has popularized the Russian tramp — the vast army 
of hooligans, sans-culottes and ex-men. 1 He calls him- 

1 Other Russians, of course, have written of the tramp — TJspensky, 
Mamine, Reshetvokov and others. 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND OTHERS 191 

self "the embittered one," as his pseudonym translates 
— his real name being Alexis Michaelevitch Pyeshkov. 
He paints in the blackest tones, often exaggerating the 
facts and atmosphere. But these are only the mediums 
in which the man happened to work; they were the 
tools that came easiest to his hands because they were 
the people and the circumstances and the outlook about 
which he knew most. Behind his literary machinery is 
the driving force of a gigantic idea, the lethargy of 
the Russian from which, once in a while, he is aroused 
to move, to act, to be. He would cure the paralysis of 
the Russian will. 

By no means did Gorky glorify crime. What he 
did glorifjr was the action in crime, in fact, anything 
that these ex-men can do to rouse themselves from their 
damnable weariness. Konovalov, the baker who 
abandons the chance for money and the woman he loves 
to follow the care-free, individualistic life of the tramp, 
describes his malady this way: "Well, you see, I be- 
came weary. It was such weariness, I tell you, little 
brother, that at moments I simply could not live. It 
seemed to me as if I were the only man on the whole 
earth and, with the exception of myself, there was no 
living thing anywhere. And in those moments every- 
thing was repugnant to me, everything in the world. 
I became a burden to myself and, if everybody were 
dead, I wouldn't even sigh. It must have been a dis- 
ease with me and the reason why I took to drink." In 
another place the same character acknowledged that 
"there is a spark lacking in their souls." This "spark" 
is what I have indicated above — the will to do, the 
energy to act and achieve. 

Much has been written about the spiritual lethargy 



192 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

that has been consequent on political suppression in 
Russia. We hear of the "Hamlet soul" that geo- 
graphical isolation, the long winters and political evils 
have given the empire. However much of the opposite 
view he may appear to champion, Gorky combats this 
fallacy relentlessly in his stories. The tramp is neither 
isolated nor suppressed in Russia. In fact, to her 
tramps and outcasts Russia owes much of the develop- 
ment of her outlying provinces. On the other hand, 
it was due to her hooligan element that some of the 
worst outbreaks of the Revolution of 1905 came to 
pass. 

The trouble with the Russian soul is that its will 
to do is not invariably transformed into the type of 
energy and action that we of the West recognize. Its 
action is rebellious and iconoclastic. It challenges and 
would destroy all authority, all contentment, fixed con- 
ditions, in short, everything stable. A strong spirit 
of Buddhistic annihilation possesses the Russ soul. 
Iserguille of Gorky's tale proclaims that "in life there 
is room for mighty deeds," and when you begin to 
analyze what Gorky's characters mean by mighty deeds, 
you discover that they are nine parts action without 
purpose — any sort of movement. To do is a mighty 
deed, no matter how or why ! 

Gorky painted an extreme type, yet it must be con- 
fessed that the elements that go to make up his tramps 
are, to a certain degree, found in almost all classes 
of Russians. So long as Gorky stuck to that stratum 
of society he was successful; when he essayed other 
types, as in Thomas Gordeyev and The Smug Citi- 
zen, he failed of popular support. Recently in his 
The Confession and his autobiography he has returned 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND OTHERS 193 

to the older forms. In these, as in the earlier works, 
he shows an ungoverned weakness for exaggeration: 
he makes his misery too miserable and his poverty too 
poor. There is a great deal less "Art for Life's Sake" 
in Gorky than his first critics claimed — and a very great 
deal of "Art for Art's Sake." 

To judge the entirety of the Russian character by 
the extreme low types that Gorky depicts would be 
manifestly unfair. The Russian is lethargic, but he 
also can be quickly stirred to the depths. The Russian 
is the blindest sort of idealist. His race is the most 
persistently idealistic of any under the sun. That is 
why the Russians make such poor business men and 
such good musicians, such poor politicians and such 
faithful soldiers. 

During the past few years Gorky's popularity in 
Russia has suffered a decline. So far as the Russians 
themselves are concerned, he is long since dead. The 
initial interest in his work was the sort of interest that 
any novelty creates. After that wore off there was 
little left. Russian readers do not care to be fed on 
literature about their underworld any more than Amer- 
ican readers do. 1 

Frankly, the interests of the thinking Russian people 
are not centered on the terrors of poverty, the evils 
of the bureaucracy, exile and -pogroms, as Americans 
have been led to believe. Americans found Gorky 
highly entertaining because they were led to believe 
that his pictures were the solemn truth and that the 

'An example of this was found in the experience of a certain Rus- 
sian editor who started to run serially Stephen Graham's With Poor 
Immigrants to America. The copy was vitally interesting, but after 
the first few installments it was stopped, because readers could not 
arouse any enthusiasm or interest over poor immigrants. 



194 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

thinking people of Russia did live on these topics. 
Gorky is past and gone. Russian letters will look upon 
his like many times again, for there are others who are 
carrying on the really essential ideas of Gorky in writ- 
ing about other strata of society in Russia. Sologub 
is depicting the lethargy of life in the small provin- 
cial town among the bourgeoisie and Kuprin has shown 
army and barracks life as it was before the war. 1 



IV 

In these sketches I have made no attempt to trace 
the development of the Russian novel (rather an am- 
bitious work to essay within the compass of one short 
chapter ! ) , but to set down ideas that have come to me 
from time to time as I read and reread the Russians. 
Fortunately for American readers, adequate transla- 
tions of most of the important Russians are now avail- 
able, and the Russian novel will in time receive its just 
share of attention. 

Literature in Russia is a sensitive index to the evo- 
lution of freedom. Now most of us, when we think 
of freedom in Russia, can visualize only freedom from 
the cruelty of the Government. The Russian knows 
other bondage — bondage more terrible and defeat more 
crushing. It knows the inherent weakness of its own 
soul. The deeper one goes into a study of Russia 
and the Russian people, the more he recognizes the 
utter futility of blaming every evil in Russia on the 
Government, of tracing back every weakness to the 
weakness of the State. It is high time we looked at 

1 Of late it would seem that Kuprin has embraced mysticism after 
a fashion. He is said to have been a bosom friend of Rasputin, the 
late court confessor and leader of a sect of fleshly mystics. 



DEFINING DOSTOEVSKY AND OTHERS 195 

Russian literature in another light. It is an index of 
self-freedom, spiritual freedom, yes, even physical free- 
dom. In this light read Dostoevsky, and you find him 
the master of spiritual freedom, of spiritual realism, 
of spiritual activity. Read Tolstoy, and you find him 
the apostle of rational freedom, of mental activity. 
Read Gorky, and, for all his bitterness, you hear the 
gospel of physical activity, the call of the will to do. 

During the past decade have arisen other men and 
other types of work. Some of it was either retreat into 
decadence or merely a reflection of the contemporary 
modes of Continental writers. 

Russia's decadence is the decadence of youth. It is 
raw, gauche, pornographic. There is little artistry 
about it. Sanine, Homo Sapiens and Kouzmine's 
The Wings are thoroughly dull books because they are 
thoroughly inartistic. Russia took to them because 
decadence was in the air. America took to them be- 
cause advertising was in the papers and because many 
American readers still hold that the presence of sex 
questions in a book automatically makes it great litera- 
ture. None of these books represented any new truth 
or pointed to any new solution of the spiritual bondage 
of Russia and the world. They were distorted reflec- 
tions of better books by greater men in other countries. 
All three books were interesting — as hashish is inter- 
esting to one who ~has just heard of the hashish habit 
— but to a world grown old and sophisticated in books 
they are puerile and footless. 

Russia will come out of that stage safely. Already 
the adolescent intelligentia have ceased sleeping with 
The Picture of Dorian Grey beneath their pillows. The 
war has given them something else to think about and 



196 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

growing industries have provided them with something 
better to do. Moreover, the reading folk of Russia 
have too much red blood in their veins, the history of 
their literature bears too many noble traditions for them 
to carry on these transient novels as indicative of Rus- 
sian thought and literary ideals. 



CHAPTER X 

THE COLORS ON THE RUSSIAN PALETTE 

UNTIL the middle of the 19th Century, art in 
Russia existed neither for Art's sake nor for 
Life's sake, as those two terms have been con- 
strued. It was very much a case of Art for God's sake. 
Like art elsewhere in Europe, it was a child of the 
Church, and even to this day certain phases of it di- 
rectly or indirectly bear the stamp of the ecclesiastical 
heritage. 

Naturally, not all art is so circumscribed. With the 
exception of one or two rare geniuses, Russian secular 
art has been the work of men who reflected the con- 
temporary modes current in Europe. Ecclesiastical art 
is as it has been for generations. Religious art, a third 
phase, is developing apart from either. The colors on 
the ecclesiastical palette, then, are one thing; the colors 
on the religious palette are another, and those on the 
secular are still different. 

Until Diaghileff came with his ballet and the Bakst 
settings, the average American knew little more of Rus- 
sian art than Verestchagin, whose canvases, exhibited 
here in the '90's, caused a stir among artists and lay- 
men alike. Perhaps it is unfortunate that our knowl- 
edge has been so limited, for there are hundreds of 
paintings worth knowing in the Tretykov Gallery in 
Moscow, in the Alexander III Museum in Petrograd 

197 



198 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

and in other galleries of that city. Verestschagin was a 
genius whose art knew the bounds of neither nation- 
ality nor period, and he is by far the greatest artist 
Russia has produced. His work bears no trace of na- 
tionalism; it was no more distinctively Russian than 
the work of a dozen other men. To say so would be 
as silly as saying that Turner was peculiarly English. 

Art possesses a passport that carries it across all fron- 
tiers. It is a cosmopolitan element. Save in the ex- 
treme contrasting cases of Oriental and Occidental art, 
it can rarely be judged by nationality. It must be 
judged either on the basis of the individual genius and 
his followers, or the distinctive period. 

Russian secular artists to-day are turning out prac- 
tically the same sort of work that characterizes various 
schools in other parts of the Continent. It is in ec- 
clesiastical art and in the art of the peasant industries 
that Russia stands alone. 



It is well to remember that in Russia churches are 
still built to the glory of God, and that the glory of 
God, as the Orthodox Church views it, is no cold, color- 
less intellectual conception. It is a matter of rich 
pigment and solid gold and priceless gems, years of 
devout labor and the expenditure of thousands of 
roubles. In short, the glory of God in Russia is very 
real and very tangible — and very costly. 

The first form of art to make its appearance was 
the decoration of church walls with religious pictures 
whereby the faithful, who rarely could read, learned 
the story of the scriptures and were impressed with the 



COLORS ON THE RUSSIAN PALETTE 199 

meaning of the dogma. The other form of ecclesias- 
tical art was the ikon or portable sacred picture, which 
was originally used in connection with the early mis- 
sionary efforts of the Church. The missionaries needed 
symbols of their teaching to show the heathen, and 
the ikon was to Kiev and Novgorod what the crucifix 
was to Rome and Canterbury. These ikons came to be 
used in the decoration of the Church itself, the ranging 
of them one above the other forming the ikonostas or 
screen between the congregation and the sanctuary. 
Around the ikons grew up the ecclesiastical art of Rus- 
sia. 

The Church has from the first shown an antipathy 
for graven images, because of the idols of the primi- 
tive Slavs. When Vladimir embraced Christianity 
there followed a wholesale destruction of images, al- 
though, in a few rare instances, religious workers con- 
tinued to carve their figures. In the early part of the 
17th Century statues were forbidden by the Patriarch 
Philaret, and later their use was further prohibited by 
an order issued in 1722. Wood carving from that 
time on became merely a decorative art restricted to 
the embellishment of the exterior of houses. 

So it has come about that the ikon is a flat painting. 
The frame and the aureole for the saint's head may 
be as elaborate as one's desires and one's purse per- 
mits, but the painting itself must be flat. Of course 
a worshiper can be just as idolatrous in his devotions 
before a painting as he can before a graven image. 
This is a point that Orthodox apologists may well skip. 
It is immaterial anyhow. 

The ikon is in every Orthodox home, shop, railroad 
station, theater, bathhouse and train, and even in houses 



200 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

of ill-repute. You cannot travel or live in Russia with- 
out this constant reminder of the spiritual life. One 
pays due respect to the ikon on entering and leaving 
the house. It is kept in the corner — the krazny ougle, 
the beautiful corner — surrounded by tapers and lamps 
and other holy pictures and often by a collection of fam- 
ily photographs. 1 What the hearth is to our homes, the 
krazny ougle is to the Russian; there the family 
gathers; it is the beginning and end of the journey, the 
start and finish of work; it is the heart of the home. 

Just as in the days when the Inquisition dictated the 
manner of painting the Virgin and made strict rulings 
on such details as the seemly covering of her feet, so 
was the manner of making ikons prescribed in the early 
days in Russia. The reason is not without its amusing 
logic. The Church considered it utterly presumptuous 
of a mere man to paint God — Whom he had not seen — 
after the whims of his own imagining. Hence the 
Church told him how it was to be done. Moreover, 
the artist had to be a devout man, neither a murderer, 
nor a drunkard, nor a liar, nor a ribald. Having ful- 
filled these personal qualifications and having proved 
that he possessed the gift for painting, he was permitted 
to set about his work. 

"The painter selected a wooden panel the required 
size and shape. Next he grooved it out a little for the 
background, and fixed slats across the back to prevent 
its slitting. After this the panel was covered with a 

1 Every Russian at one stage of his life has a flair for being photo- 
graphed. It is usually while the lad is doing his military service. 
For the two months preceding Easter the photographers of Russia 
are worked to death snapping these lads in their full-dress uniform 
and cocky airs. The photograph is then sent home for an Easter 
present and hung up in the krazny ougle, a reminder to the family 
not to forget the boy in their prayers. 



COLORS ON THE RUSSIAN PALETTE 201 

kind of liquid glue, and over that was laid a cement, 
of which alabaster was a component part; it was then 
scraped smooth with a knife and polished with a rough, 
fibrous plant known as Horse-tail. At a later date 
the panel was occasionally covered with canvas, on 
which several layers of plaster were laid. The studios 
of the master ikonographers provided a few traditional 
models, and when it was desired to repeat one of these 
designs, its outline was painted over with a compound 
of dried garlic, Chinese ink and vermilion or other 
strong coloring matter; a sheet of dampened parch- 
ment or paper was pressed upon the surface of the 
model picture, and as soon as it had received the neces- 
sary impression, it was transferred to the prepared 
panel and rubbed over the back with a burnisher or 
polished stone. In the case of an original design, the 
painter sometimes drew it straight away upon the panel 
in pencil or Chinese ink. In the frescoes and larger 
pictures the outlines were scratched or grooved out with 
a pointed instrument, the process being called grapheya. 
The colors were thus kept distinct from each other. 
The trees and hills and other accessories of ikonographic 
landscape were put in first, then the robes, and last of 
all the faces. Finally, the picture was treated with 
an oily varnish called alif" 1 

From time to time Russian artists have painted 
ikons in other fashions than the accepted mode, with 
varying degrees of success. Among^the moujiks, how- 
ever, there is a strong feeling that an ikon is ineffectual 
unless it is painted in the regulation, stereotyped style 

1 The Russian Arts. Rosa Newmarch. Pages 50-51. New York, 
1915- 



202 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

— the crude brush work and cruder drawing that char- 
acterized the Byzantine school. 

The manufacture of these ikons now comprises one 
section of the peasant industries. It thrives especially 
in the Vladimir Government. Here ikons are made 
both for the Orthodox and for the Old Believers. The 
simpler kinds can be had for a few copecks ; the prices 
range thence into the thousands and hundreds of thou- 
sands of roubles. These very costly and heavily jew- 
eled types are generally found in the churches. The 
miracle working ikon of the Virgin of Vladimir in the 
Cathedral of the Assumption at Moscow, to quote one 
example, bears among its jewels a single emerald that 
alone is valued at $50,000. 

In addition to the painted ikons are those of brass, 
which can be occasionally picked up in our antique 
shops. They are either in a single panel or triptych 
ingeniously hinged to fold up into small compass. The 
figures are slightly raised and the background picked 
out with vari-colored enamels. The cruder work is 
generally characteristic of early Russian craftsmen, 
whereas those that show a finer technique can generally 
be classed as of Armenian manufacture. These small 
ikons are carried with one on a journey and, in the 
case of the smallest types, are worn about the neck 
much in the manner of a scapular. 

11 

Ecclesiastical frescoes have always held a lively in- 
terest for Russia's artists. The earliest work was ex- 
ecuted in mosaics after the fashion of Byzantium, but 
the demand for quicker and less expensive work and a 



COLORS ON THE RUSSIAN PALETTE 203 

more workable medium called into use the painted 
mural. 

Greek artists were responsible for much of the earli- 
est work at Kiev — and fragments of it are still to be 
seen in the old cathedral there. When Novgorod in 
the north outstripped Kiev, Russian artists began to 
be employed in the decoration of the church walls. As 
in the matters of Church administration and dogma, 
so in the decoration of the edifices, the guiding in- 
fluence of Byzantium was paramount up to the 13th 
Century. The drawing is crude and the color, while 
now toned down by time, has evidently been strong — 
bluish green and vermilion predominating. 

By the 15th Century the religious artists began to 
draw away from Byzantium; the backgrounds of the 
frescoes executed at this time show Russian scenes and 
characters. This development was contemporary with 
the rise of Moscow and the evolution of the Russian 
state about that city. The greatest artist of the period 
was Roubliev, whose decorations are still to be seen 
on the walls of the Cathedral of the Trinity in the 
Sergievo Monastery outside Moscow. For the most 
part, the work of this period was done by monks and 
in the course of a few generations it became a highly 
specialized art — one man painting the scenery, another 
the faces, a third the robes. 

In the 16th and 17th Centuries this form of ikonog- 
raphy reached the highest point of its development. It 
had for patrons the wealthy family of Straganov, the 
Medicis of Russia, and it also was influenced by Dutch 
and Danish painters who introduced the idea of paint- 
ing these church frescoes from life instead of making 
them repeat the accepted, stereotyped designs. The 



204 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

stiff austerity of the figures began to pass away and the 
work showed signs of humanity and sympathy. 

Of the later painters who have done striking church 
frescoes, Victor Vasnietsov and Michael Nesterov, his 
disciple, stand out above the rest. Both men have 
given a new impetus to this form of ecclesiastical art 
and under their influence it would seem to have begun 
a new development. To their names can be added 
the name of Vrubel because of his ikons for the Kirilov 
Monastery, in which his studies of the Byzantine modes 
are evident. 

We can say with assurance that ecclesiastical art in 
Russia will be a vital part of her artistic development, 
because so long as the Church enjoys the support of 
the Government and of the majority of the people, it 
will be in a position to foster this specialized but im- 
portant side of Russian art and to keep it distinctively 
Russian. 

I have spoken at length of ecclesiastical art for the 
simple reason that I sincerely believe that it, the peas- 
ant industries, the folk music and the dance are the 
four phases of artistic expression which are show- 
ing any national individuality in Russia to-day. Dis- 
tinction of style unquestionably abounds, so does per- 
sonal individuality, but, the critics to the contrary, it 
is a debatable point whether one can point to the work 
of any school in the past century or the present and 
say, "That is Russian. That expresses the Russian 
spirit and exhibits the Russian viewpoint on life. 
That shows the East-and-Westness of the race." 

Consider the architecture of Russian cities, for ex- 
ample. The first thing the traveler is struck with in 
Petrograd and even in Moscow is the prevalence of 



COLORS ON THE RUSSIAN PALETTE 205 

the Classical designs. With few exceptions the archi- 
tecture of Russia during the past three centuries has 
been French and Italian. This applies not alone to 
palaces, public buildings and theaters, but to the 
datcha, the country house, as well. In ecclesiastical 
architecture Russia presents unquestioned individu- 
ality. The Byzantine modes are still strong, and save 
for such examples as St. Isaac's Cathedral and the 
Kazan Cathedral at Petrograd and the Church of St. 
Andrew at Kronstadt, the influence of Continental 
architecture did not penetrate into ecclesiastical build- 
ing. 

The one exception I would make to this denial of 
the existence of a distinctly individualistic and national 
school of Russian art is in book-illustrating. In this 
we find art registering the economic interests of a cul- 
tured people. During the Slavophil days of the past 
century and afterward, an awakening interest in na- 
tional folklore spread over Russia. In our time it 
finds expression in the Russia Ballet and in the Bakst 
settings. It also found expression in illustrations for 
books of fairy stories and the bylinas or hero ballads. 
In the work of Bihbin, Miss Polyenov, Davydov and 
Korovin, to name only a few, traces of nationalism are 
evident. 

in 

The colors on the peasant's palette are crude. The 
moujik has a passion for lively colors. 1 He wears a 
bright-red blouse, he paints his furniture, his spoons, 
his walls; his women- folk embroider their dresses in 

1 In the peasant's argot, precrasny — "very red" — means "very beau- 
tiful." 



206 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

all the colors of the rainbow. This penchant for ele- 
mental colors is strong and primitive and healthy. 
There is no pose about it. The peasant likes strong 
color for the same reason that he likes strong drink — he 
is an extremist. 

In the ingenuity of the carved and painted peasant 
toys, in the colors of their embroideries, in the intricacy 
of their native jewelry and the honest crudeness of 
their pottery one finds virile craftsmanship unspoiled 
as yet by too flattering a popularity. 

In their cleverness of construction and keenness of 
caricature, the toys especially show a remarkable 
heritage from the East. There are the dolls that fit 
one into another, the "pull" toys — you pull a stick and 
the figures on it move with amazing realism — and the 
carved and turned games and knickknacks that are 
found in every Russian household. 

On my desk is a varied assortment — a late Christmas 
gift from a Russian friend. Here is a little wooden 
mushroom, no bigger than a walnut. Slip off the top 
and out tumbles a jackstraw game, a complete tea-set — 
samovar, cups, saucers, goblets, cordial bottles, pitchers, 
not one over a quarter of an inch high, yet each is per- 
fect in every detail. They have been turned on a lathe. 
Imagine the skill and patience of the koustar who made 
them. 

Another toy is of the "pull" variety. A stick of 
wood with a pull rod run through it holds the figure 
of an old woman dragging a squalling youth by the 
hand. Pull the rod and Disobedient Ivan precipitately 
approaches the inevitable switching. Of the same 
character is the old moujik plowing. There is the 
broken-down, sad-eyed horse, the aged farmer with his 



COLORS ON THE RUSSIAN PALETTE 207 

gnarled hands clasped about the handle of the rude 
shosha — the native plow — and the reins thrown about 
his shoulders. Each time you pull the rod old Serge 
drives the coulter deep. 

In addition to these are several varieties of crows — 
crows carved and painted, crows carved and stained. 
The crow is the lucky bird of Russia. 

Travel eastward through the Russian Empire and 
search out the native bazaars in the obscure towns, and 
toys such as these will be found. Their counterparts 
are also to be picked up in native Chinese and Japanese 
shops — that is, the shops which do not specialize in 
German-made tourist knickknacks. It would seem 
that the toy-makers of Russia learned their art more 
from their eastern neighbors and Tartar progenitors 
than from the Teutonic masters of toys. 

Of late years, since the Government has been foster- 
ing the handicrafts, some remarkably beautiful furni- 
ture has been created in the Moscow kustarny trade- 
schools. It is heavy of line and cumbersome, but 
relieved by intricate carving of conventionalized 
native designs. Some of it is painted after the peasant 
manner; most of it, however, is simply stained and 
oiled, the carving being sufficiently decorative in itself. 

In these products can be read the promise of a dis- 
tinctive art that may be continued when life in Russia 
has again assumed normal proportions. It is different 
from the alleged peasant furniture that Vienna or Ber- 
lin has produced, resembling rather the Scandinavian 
native furniture. If its manufacture is developed into 
a paying industry, it may result in the creation of dis- 
tinctive interiors in Russian homes. The interior of the 
average Russian home is still a sad copy of the worst 



208 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

days of the French gilt, crimson and scroll atrocities, 
and anything that will relieve the condition will be a 
cause for thanksgiving. 

IV 

In considering the broad aspects of Russian art it is 
not irrelevant to note the fact that the intellectual 
classes are deeply interested in its progress and pro- 
ductions. The cultured Russian, like his brother of 
the moujik class, is an extremist; when he is cultured 
he is very cultured, his knowledge and interests are 
catholic. He is keenly alive to what is being done in 
art and literature and music the world over, and he 
appreciates the potentialities of his own people. Art 
in Russia does not want for popular interest and sup- 
port, nor for the support of the aristocracy and the 
royal family. Ever since the time of Peter the Great 
the Tsar has been the patron of the arts and it has 
been due to royal assistance and interest that many of 
Russia's greatest artists have been able to succeed. 

Previous to the war — and it is even more so since 
the war has given the Empire a solidarity — the cultured 
people have been fostering all forms of art and handi- 
craft which are distinctly national. While at times 
the effort has been grotesquely a pose, there is a lively 
and very sincere interest in the artistic potentialities 
of the peoples of the Empire. We, on the other side 
of the world, have only seen snatches of this, but what 
we have seen has awakened unwonted enthusiasm. Un- 
questionably, Russia has something important and vital 
to say to the world of art, just as she has had something 
important and vital to say to the world of music. In 
that day when her voice reaches us, we will understand ! 




CHAPTER XI 

WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 

NE does not ordinarily look upon the Russians 
as a happy people. Assemble the composite 
Russ from the pictures given of him in Rus- 
sian novels, in popular legends and in newspaper re- 
ports, and he "stacks up" a dour, sodden fellow with 
a political chip on his shoulder, a vodka bottle in one 
hand and a bomb in the other. Or, if that would seem 
too much of a caricature, he might be pictured as a 
rather large, lethargic, square-bearded gentleman in 
furs, who suffers from some strange pornial passion 
and a weakness for gambling. It is indeed difficult for 
the outside world to adjust itself to the realization that 
these Russians and all their brothers are a lively race — 
that Russia really does sing. 

When the Russian Ballet was presented to American 
audiences, when American choirmasters discovered the 
singular spiritual quality of Russian church music and 
performed it for American congregations, when the 
various symphony leaders and opera managers pre- 
sented the works of Russian composers, America was 
afforded a glimpse of Russia just as genuine and sin- 
cere as that given by the pages of Turgenev, Tolstoy, 
Dostoevsky and Gorky. Contrasts as they are, the two 
propound the strange paradox of the Russian tempera- 

209 



210 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

ment, and point out the wisdom of refusing to judge 
Russia and the Russians solely by one expression of 
the national genus. For the same Russ who weeps 
also sings ; the same folk who would seem to be utterly 
paralyzed in will dance with a fervor and grace rarely 
found in other lands. 

The Russians are as instinctively musical as the Ger- 
mans, and, striking an average, their folk music — the 
spontaneous music of the race — is lighter in touch and 
more cheery in tone. By birth, Russia is a singing na- 
tion, a dancing nation. Make no mistake about that. 

The traveler to Russia soon discovers this pleasant 
truth, and the recollections of the spontaneous music 
of the people can never be forgotten. . . . There was 
that first morning in Petersburg years back, when we 
were awakened by singing and rushed to the window 
to see four huge privates tramping down the Prospekt 
singing — simply singing to keep in step. . . . Then 
there were the songs the emigrants used to sing on the 
train going to Tcheliabinsk and the Russian Land of 
Promise, the queer yapping songs that they accom- 
panied with balalaika and accordion. . . . And the 
funeral in the little Shilka hamlet on a cold March 
morning when the farmer choir sang with a devout 
fervor and beauty that paled into insignificance mem- 
ories of the gilded glory of the Imperial Chapel Choir. 
. . . And the Cossack hymns to the Virgin that used 
to float down breeze in the wan twilights after the 
boom of the sunset gun from the barracks around the 
bend had ricocheted through the cleft of the stark, 
gaunt hills and died down across the stretches of pur- 
ple snow and the jagged, ice-choked Amur. 



WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 211 



All Russia sings. No nation under the sun has such 
a body of folk songs, and none possesses such variety. 
From arctic Russia in the north to the Caucasus, from 
the Ukraine to the Far East provinces, the people sing, 
and sing spontaneously. The extent of this territory 
with its diversity of climates and peoples has led to 
confusion by those who know Russian folk songs only 
superficially and judge them all of one sort — the sad 
lamentations and the melancholy love ballads. 

Like the people who make and sing them, folk songs 
are products of environment. To be sure, the subject 
matter may be national or a local adaptation of a racial 
theme, but the nature of the melodies themselves, the 
quality of their tunes and rhythm are all deeply af- 
fected by climate and natural surroundings. Thus, the 
songs of Scotland differ from the folk songs of Kent 
and Surrey. The former are more melancholy, they 
reflect the environment of the north. The same is true 
of the folk songs of the north of Russia, whereas the 
songs of the Ukraine, the Crimea and the Caucasus are 
quite different. In Great Russia the ballads celebrate 
courage, daring and orgy, but in the Dnieper Valley 
the songs reflect the kindliness of nature — they are 
about the grass, the trees, the stars and man's com- 
munion with them. It is rather unfortunate in this 
respect that Russia has been so much alluded to as the 
Empire of the North, for she is also an empire of the 
South and of the East, and in classifying her native 
ballads one must not forget her more pleasant climes 
that have produced a laughing people and their laugh- 
ing songs. 



212 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Another phase of folk songs in Russia is that the 
more clement regions have produced a greater body 
of ballads than the less kindly. While this is undoubt- 
edly due to the natural increase or decrease of popula- 
tion according to climates, it cannot be questioned that 
singing Nature produces a singing people. The 
Ukraine, for example, supplies an appreciable majority 
of the Russian peasant songs as well as most of the 
Empire's finest singers. From the Ukraine were chosen 
the first members of the Imperial Chapel Choir, and 
ever since Little Russia has contributed the majority 
of the choristers. 

As in other nations, the first music was the music 
of the epic songs and the ceremonial ballads. The 
former are called in Russia bylinas? the main groups 
being the Vladimir Cycle of Kiev, the Novgorod Cycle 
and the Moscow or Imperial Cycle. Later bylinas re- 
count the glories of Ivan the Terrible, Peter the Great 
and even subsequent personages. These songs, al- 
though corrupted and combined with others in the 
course of mouth-to-mouth transmission, were brought 
into existence by definite historic facts and events. The 
ceremonial songs, on the other hand, were inherited 
from the heathen days and were preserved for certain 
special occasions. Although the heathen customs were 
taken over by the Church and the old festivals merged 
into Church holy days, the ceremonial songs still re- 
tained their place in the hearts of the people. In time 
they lost their purely ceremonial nature and became 
part of the everyday songs of the countryside. The 
Church has always seemed to fear an evil result from 

1 An excellent translation of these bylinas has been made by Isabel 
Florence Hapgood under the title of The Epic Songs of Russia. New 
York, 1886, 1916. 



WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 213 

the singing of such folk ballads, and even as late as 
the early 19th Century carried on a persistent and 
senseless warfare against them. In spite of this many 
exist to this day and on them have been founded much 
of modern Russian music. While the last few years 
have witnessed a revival of interest in the bylinas, only 
in one region of the empire are they still sung in the 
old fashion — in the remote swamp of the Olonetz Gov- 
ernment in the extreme northeast. 

The ancient manner of singing these folk songs was 
not unlike that which obtained in other countries dur- 
ing the Middle Ages, and since Russia has developed 
slower than the rest of the Continent, there are still 
to be found remnants of the ancient customs. Itinerant 
psalm singers, Kalyeky Perekozhie, are to be found on 
the highways and at the shrines, performing their stiks 
or religious ballads. In his collection 1 of folk songs 
Rimsky-Korsakov has preserved their "Greeting." 
There were, in addition, the nursery rhymes and jin- 
gles, the lullabies, the workmen's songs, the epic songs 
sung by wandering mummers and minstrels at the 
houses of the boyars, the songs of seed planting and 
harvest, the winter ballads and the ballads of spring. 

The musical nature of these songs has been described 
by Cesar Cui : "Russian folk songs are generally writ- 
ten within a very restricted compass, and only rarely 
move beyond the interval of a fifth or sixth. The older 
the song, the narrower is the range of its compass. The 
theme is always short, sometimes extending no farther 

1 The earliest collection of folk songs was made by Pratch, a musi- 
cian from Prague in 1790. It contained 149 songs. Balakirev in 1866 
brought out a collection of 46, and later Rimsky-Korsakov produced 
his collection of 100. Since that time there have been innumerable 
collections. Any music store carries at least one or two in stock. 



214 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

than two bars, but these two bars are repeated as often 
as the exigencies of the text demand. 

"The folk songs are sung either by a single voice 
or by a chorus. In the latter case, a single voice leads 
off with the subject, and then the chorus takes it up. 1 
The harmonization of these tunes is traditional and ex- 
tremely original. The different voices of the chorus 
approach each other until they form a unison, or else 
separate into chords (only the chords are often not 
filled in), and, generally speaking, a melody treated 
polyphonically ends in a unison. 

"The songs for a single voice are frequently accom- 
panied on a stringed instrument called a balalaika — a 
kind of guitar with a triangular belly, the strings of 
which are either plucked or set vibrating by a glissando. 
As to the songs for chorus they are rarely provided with 
an accompaniment; when they do have one, it is played 
on a sort of oboe, which uses the melody as the basis 
of a number of contrapuntal improvisations which are, 
no doubt, not much in accordance with the strict rules 
of music, but are exceedingly picturesque. 2 

"Russian folk songs may be classified in the follow- 
ing ways : singing games, or songs sung on feast days 
to the accompaniment of different games and dances; 
songs of special occasions, of which the wedding song 
is the most popular type ; street songs, or serenades for 
chorus of a jovial or burlesque character; songs of the 

x The parallel to this form of singing is found in the recitation of 
the choir offices. The leader of the peasant song — really a precentor 
— strikes up the theme, the zapievokya, and the others join in with 
the podgolossly or free imitations of the theme. R. W. 

2 At present the accordion and even the mouth organ and the Jew's 
harp are used by the peasant for accompanying songs and dances; 
in fact, the accordion is even more seen than the balalaika since it 
requires less skill of the performer. R. W. 



WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 215 

bourlaks or of the barge-haulers; and songs for a single 
voice of every sort and kind." 

The revival of interest in folk songs in Russia has 
been steadily growing in the past fifty years. Up to 
the middle of the last century the cityward movement 
had not become a factor in the life of the countryside, 
and the majority of the folk songs were as yet uncor- 
rupted by the street ballads of a lower order. It is 
perhaps fortunate for Russia that at this time the V 
Narodny Movement, taken up by the intelligentia, di- 
rected its efforts among other things to a preservation 
of the old country ballads in some permanent form 
for posterity. Professor Wiener in his An Interpreta- 
tion of the Russian People makes an interesting claim 
apropos of this interest in folk ballads. He states that 
its source was American, that Sokalski, having heard 
our negro songs while living in this country, returned 
to Russia resolved to collect and preserve the songs of 
the moujiks. 

From these plebeian sources Russian music has 
worked its way up to the plane of its finest composi- 
tions. In fact, the School of Russian music owes its 
individuality to this body of folk formulas and to their 
peculiar character in harmony. 



11 

The early Church music, like all things connected 
with Russian Christianity, was inherited from By- 
zantium and later was crossed with Greek influence, an 
influence still apparent today. 

St. John of Damascus, who lived in the 8th Century, 
was the first to systematize the Church music. He 



216 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

wrote many of the hymns sung today in the Russian, 
Roman and Anglican Churches, and it was due to his 
efforts that the Russian Choir offices were standardized. 
Ever since the 15th Century the Russian court has 
maintained a royal chapel choir, and to this day in the 
choir of the Imperial Chapel one can hear choral sing- 
ing equaled nowhere else in the world. The voices 
are all male — men and boys whose lives are devoted 
solely to this religious service. Ivan the Terrible, fear- 
some though his repute, was a patron of this choir and 
is said to have composed several sets of music for the 
Church services. Later came men such as Bereyovsky 
(1745-1777) and Bortniansky (1751-1825), the latter 
rated as the Russian Palestrina, whose labors were de- 
voted to the development of the Church music. Since 
that time practically every Russian musician has com- 
posed some music for the Church. It is, of course, 
purely choral without instrumental accompaniment, 
since no instruments are permitted in the Orthodox 
Church service. Some of it is wonderfully simple; 
other compositions have essayed stupendous arrange- 
ments for no less than twenty-four voice parts. 

in 

Until the early 17th Century, Russian music was 
restricted to these two classes — folk songs and Church 
music. In the reign of Tsar Alexis Mikailovich 
(1645-1676) some morality plays with incidental mu- 
sic were presented under royal patronage. This might 
be termed the beginning of Russian secular music. 
Peter the Great organized the first body of musicians 
and ever since those times music in Russia has had the 



WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 217 

loyal support of the royal family. 1 Under the 
Empresses Ann, Elizabeth and Catherine II and the 
Tsars Paul I and Alexander I, everything was done to 
foster and disseminate Russian music and music in gen- 
eral. Native artists were generously supported in their 
work, and foreign artists were invited to Russia, where 
they were kept by the court and paid large salaries to 
compose and perform music for the delectation of both 
the upper classes and the common people. Under these 
alien musicians a great body of music was composed — 
operas, symphonies and chamber music — but it was not 
until Glinka wrote his "A Life for the Tsar" (1836) 
that there was manifested in Russian music the striking 
national individuality which has ever since character- 
ized it. 

Glinka's opera completely revolutionized Russian 
music. Instead of following Continental modes and 
themes, he turned to his own native land for inspira- 
tion. "Not only the subject, but the music, too, is to 
be Russian," he said, speaking of this opera as he wrote 
it. He was the first to introduce the Russian folk songs 
into a composition in their native manner and construc- 
tion, and in that lies much of the mobility and indi- 
viduality of the opera and of the work of the men 
who followed after. As Cui stated, "Glinka has cre- 
ated a fully equipped Russian school of opera. 'A Life 
for the Tsar' was born in full armor, like Minerva, 

1 Peter is said to have issued an imperial ukase suggesting that the 
people have music with their meals, since music had a refining in- 
fluence! In his characteristic Rooseveltian manner he also issued 
imperial "invitations" to the people to attend the theater — and per- 
haps for the same reason. The Empress Elizabeth exhibited some 
of the same lusty and intolerant support of music. It is said that she 
imposed a fine of fifty roubles on every guest who failed to attend 
her court concerts. 



218 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

and its author from the very first moment found a 
place amongst the greatest composers." The reward 
for this labor was Glinka's appointment as Choral Di- 
rector of the Imperial Chapel, one of the highest mu- 
sical honors Russia has to confer. With his name starts 
the Russian School of Music, a school as distinctive as 
the French and of far greater possibilities, as its devel- 
opment has shown. 

The second great step in the development of the Rus- 
sian school was the forming of the Moguchaya Kzuchka 
or 'The Mighty Group" ; in the vernacular, "The Big 
Five" — Cesar Cui, Rimsky-Korsakov, Borodin, Bala- 
kirev, and Moussorgsky. It was a group of young men, 
of which Cui was the mouthpiece, that had exalted ideas 
of its own talents and ambitions, and completely 
scorned men of the caliber of Rubinstein and Tchaikov- 
sky. Like all young reformers, they were iconoclasts, 
and with the peculiar fervor of youth they made them- 
selves so well known through their propaganda that 
they are not to be overlooked in even this brief sketch 
of Russian development. They had a marked penchant 
for the recitative in operatic music that became a verita- 
ble weakness with them. They proclaimed that "oper- 
atic music ought always to have an intrinsic value, as 
absolute music, apart from the text," that operatic 
ought in itself to be true, beautiful music. Working 
along these lines, they strove to revolutionize the Rus- 
sian opera, a reform as radical as Wagner effected in 
Germany. 

Both the operatic and orchestral music of this group 
is, by this time, well known to American audiences, and 
the limitations of the work of each of the five men have 
been matter for current periodical comment. Despite 



WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 219 

their insistent methods, despite the contempt they 
showed for those who would not agree with them, they 
carried on the heritage of Russian music and found 
ample inspiration in the folk songs of their native land. 
Some of it was not strictly Slavic — some was distinctly 
Oriental and Persian, as in the case of certain composi- 
tion of Rimsky-Korsakov and Moussorgsky. Here 
again the vast extent of the Russian Empire must be 
taken into account, for while the folk songs of the three 
ethnological groups of Russia — Little, Great and 
White — comprise the essential basis of the inspiration 
of Russian music, it is just as legitimate to include 
inspiration caught from the peoples on the outer fringes 
of the empire. Even Glinka in his opera, "Russian and 
Lioudmilla," used Tartar, Arab and Persian dance 
themes. 

Coincident with "The Big Five" were two composers 
whose works have lifted the Russian School to a place 
justly preeminent. The years have taken no toll of 
Tchaikovsky and Rubinstein, and when the works of 
the noisy reformers shall have been forgotten, these 
two will remain favorites with audiences the world 
over. 

Rubinstein and Tchaikovsky were not theorists ; they 
had no musical axes to grind ; they were simply supreme 
geniuses who placed their mark on all branches of Rus- 
sian music and left it nobler for their efforts. 

Rubinstein was as much a giant in creation as he 
was a giant in the flesh, a composer of the highest or- 
der and one of the unquestionably great virtuosos of 
the 19th Century. His tours about the world took the 
nature of a triumphal progress, and those who heard 
him can never forget the man's prodigious vitality and 



220 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

his supreme technique. Like any great genius he lacked 
neither champions nor critics. Even in Russia, the 
Young School of the fervid "Five" attacked him at 
every opportunity because he refused to break with 
the traditions of the past. In other countries as well 
he aroused storms of comment from those who set 
about to judge him — all of which, of course, greatly 
amused Rubinstein. Writing about this to a friend 
he said : "The Jews consider me a Christian, the Chris- 
tians a Jew; the Classics call me a Wagnerian, the 
Wagnerians a Classic; the Russians say I am a Ger- 
man, the Germans say I am a Russian." The Germans 
were the closest to the truth, for whatever trace of 
foreign influence is found in Rubinstein's work, it was 
preeminently Russian and was permeated with true 
Russian coloring. Moreover, through his efforts, Rus- 
sian music became known to the world and the first 
Russian Conservatory of Music was founded. 

Equally criticized but less indifferent to it was 
Rubinstein's contemporary, Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky, 
a composer of extraordinary fertility in all forms of 
music. In America he is better known for his sym- 
phonies and chamber music than for his operas, and 
an all-Tchaikovsky program invariably means a 
crowded house and an enthusiastic audience. 

The beginnings of Tchaikovsky's career show strong 
alien influence (in his chamber music especially he 
manifested the inspiration of Liszt) but in the course 
of time he developed his own distinct personality. 
While he availed himself time and again of Russian 
folk themes, as, for example, in the Second Symphony, 
he cannot be said to have depended wholly upon them 
for his inspiration. He had a distinct leaning toward 



WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 221 

the warmer, more sensuous music of Italy, and he re- 
garded the presence of Italian influence in his work 
as one of the secrets of its quick appeal. However 
many themes he borrowed from his native land, he in- 
variably clothed them in the richness of the South. 
Both the Pathetic Symphony, No. 6, and No. 7 are ex- 
pressions of the luxuriousness of sorrow. The same 
element will be found in his songs, of which he wrote 
a great number; the sentiment in them is the sentiment 
of the South — a trieste sentiment, sincere and over- 
whelming but reserved in some respects; quite a con- 
trast to German sentiment which is a bit sloppy and 
bourgeois. Traces of the same sort of feeling can be 
found in the south of Russia — in the more clement 
climates. A regal realism, an aristocratic sorrow, a 
rich, mauve sentiment — these are the things which char- 
acterize the work of Tchaikovsky. A reflection of his 
life*? Doubtless, for he lived in a world of extreme 
heights and depths, for the most part self -created, but 
none the less genuine. 

Whereas Rubinstein was a lusty poet who happened 
to find expression in music, Tchaikovsky was a deli- 
cately adjusted musician whose depth of feeling could 
be expressed only in the fine nuances of tone and 
rhythm. 

IV 

When the Russian Ballet was presented, in both New 
York and Boston it was subjected to police censor- 
ship. The apparently inartistic and Puritanical atti- 
tude of the law aroused great indignation from those 
who saw in this suppression Art "crucified on the hill 
of intolerance." . . . 



222 THE RUSSIANS : AN INTERPRETATION 

But here and there in Russia the peasants will point 
out to you stone circles, and explain that they are 
the petrified bodies of young women who danced the 
native Whitsun dances so demonstratively and with 
such a showing of ankles that the spirits of the forest, 
the roussalki, caught them in their sin and turned them 
to stone ! 

For a matter of fact, the native dances of the people, 
with the exception of the wild Cossack dance, the 
Kazackok, and the September "Dance of the Beer 
Brewing," are simple movements, scarcely pronounced 
and with little demonstration. The wild dances are 
restricted to men; and a dance that requires more 
than the raising of the foot slightly from the ground 
is considered too indecent for any self-respecting peas- 
ant woman to join. 1 

It is well to remember this fact in judging the Rus- 
sian ballet. However much it may lay claim to the 
inspiration of the peasant dances, the later forms of 
the ballet as interpreted by Nijinsky and Pavlowa are 
the product of a Russian school of dancing rather than 
the product of the people. In its development it has 
gone far from its source. Acceding to the demand for 
exotic color, form and rhythm, it has long since passed 
from the original phases. It has taken music not in- 
tended for choreographic purposes and set to it a 
gorgeous scenic display and corrupted forms of the 
old folk formulas. In short, the modern Russian ballet 
as it can be seen in New York, London, Paris and 
even Moscow and Petrograd is not a dance of the 
people; it is a development of the Russian school of 

1 Apropos of this the folk songs are equally decorus. Of the thou- 
sands of peasant ballads, there are few indeed that would make a girl 
blush. 



WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 223 

dancing that in the past found its source in the folk 
games of the masses. 

These games, as I have said, are very simple, decor- 
ous and quiet. The older girls usually take part, with 
the men furnishing music from an accordion or 
balalaika. They celebrate the wedding feast, the com- 
ing of spring, the sowing of the seed, the garnering 
of the harvest, and in some instances the old heathen 
legends which are part and parcel of moujik folk lore. 
The capering and horse play that characterized the 
English morris dances in Tudor days, the sophistica- 
tion that accompanies their revival, and the indis- 
criminate mingling of the sexes — these things are quite 
unknown in the moujik dancing games. The general 
movements of the dances are not unlike those of our 
old-fashioned cotillions ; the girls group themselves into 
two lines, facing each other, turn about, beat time with 
their heels, turn around again, sing the accompaniment 
songs. There is scarcely any gesture, and the foot 
simply trips along the ground. These are the move- 
ments that characterize the Khorovad, danced during 
the first week after Easter to celebrate the return of 
spring, the Trepak, the Kamarinskaya, the Golouvets 
(the Dance of the Doves) and the Cuckoo Dance — the 
most famous of the peasant games. 



For over 300 years the ballet has been a distinctive 
phase of higher Russian life. As early as 1675 ballets 
were presented before the court, and in his reign Peter 
the Great, with characteristic insistence on Western 
culture, gave the ballet his hearty imperial sanction. 



224 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Italian and French ballet masters were imported under 
the Empress Ann, and a Ballet Academy came into 
being as a branch of the Government, which it has 
remained ever since. 

To a stranger this paternal fostering of the arts by 
the Russian Government is a situation difficult to un- 
derstand. ... In Yakutsk, in the hinterlands of the 
Empire where the Tsar owns great stretches of gold 
fields, a miner rocks his cradle in an icy stream and 
watches for the yellow dust. As he gathers up the 
precious sand, part of it is laid aside for the Tsar, and 
in turn the Tsar's privy treasurer pays it out in tuition 
for the Nijinskys and Mordkins, the Pavlowas and 
Lopoukowas that you and I witness from comfortable 
seats in our theaters. 

For the Imperial Ballet is as much a part of the 
Russian Government as the army, and with even 
greater care than is exercised in selecting her soldiers 
does Russia select her dancers. They are fed, clothed, 
taught and cared for with a jealousy that indeed few 
children in the Empire know. Their little bodies and 
minds are regularly and tirelessly trained for the great 
art they are eventually to practice. When they have 
finished their course they become part of the regular 
ballets. In return for this work they receive a modest 
salary, the guarantee of an honorable living and a 
place in the society of their world, and a pension when 
their dancing days are over. Whenever a member of 
the Imperial Ballet leaves Russia he must receive Gov- 
ernment sanction, and he is permitted to remain abroad, 
only for a stated period. Some of the artists have 
chosen to forfeit their pensions and positions with the 
Government for the prospect of larger salaries in other 



WHEN RUSSIA SINGS 225 

lands, but the majority of the artists return at the end 
of their furlough to delight the people of the land 
which makes their art possible. 

There are two branches of the ballet at the two 
Imperial opera houses — the Mariansky Theater in 
Petrograd and the Opera House in Moscow. At both 
these theaters ballet pantomimes are presented on an 
average of twice a week and are well attended by all 
classes. 

The revolt against the stiff Classical ballet was first 
begun by the Imperial Russian Academy, and due to 
its efforts the more Romantic form of pantomime danc- 
ing has come into vogue and into a permanent position 
in the arts. Inspiration was first caught from the 
dancing of Isadora Duncan and the new school, 
cordially welcomed by the Director of the Ballet, M. 
Fokine, was fostered by the growing lack of interest 
in the classical forms. It was a spontaneous movement 
on the part of the artists themselves, and was received 
with equal spontaneity by Russian audiences and art- 
ists of other crafts. Musicians and scenic artists joined 
the movement and threw their efforts into the work — 
Rimsky-Korsakov, Glazounov, Bakst and a host of 
others. Rich material was found within the bounds of 
the Russian Empire, in the legends of old Moscovy, 
in Persia, in the Caucasus, in Siberia, and in the lore 
of the Cossacks. Like the Russian School of Music, 
the Russian School of Dancing was born in full armor. 
Little wonder that it captured the world! For no 
one nation has ever made so great a contribution to 
the choreographic arts and no form of dancing has 
been so readily accepted by the discerning world. 

In her schools of music and dancing Russia has an- 



226 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

swered, as no amount of denial could, the charge of 
barbarism. The taunt flung at Russia by her enemies 
has been flung back in two noble expressions, expres- 
sions far nobler than the world has hitherto seen. "The 
bear that walks like a man" has turned out to be a 
man that dances like a satyr and a maid that flutters 
like a swan ! 

In accepting these two forms of art in Russia the 
world has acknowledged a great spiritual fact about 
Russia, it has come to a realization that in no country 
is art more pure and more unfettered. The musical 
successors of Rubinstein and Tchaikovsky and the 
Moguchaka Kiuchka, as well as the dancers now 
training to be the Nijinskys and Pavlowas of a new 
generation, are nobly carrying on the old traditions. 
In their own land they find ample inspiration to per- 
petuate these pure arts so generously given the world. 



CHAPTER XII 

THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 

RUSSIA did not possess a Horace Greeley to bid 
her young men "go West." The "West" of 
Russia lies to the eastward, beyond the Urals; 
and the young men who first went there were not con- 
sulted on their destinies. They went — that was all. 
And because so many went the way of exile in those 
400 years, and because their sufferings were untold and 
their sacrifices indescribable, Siberia today bears the 
worst name of any region in the world. For genera- 
tions it was a pariah land, a prison land. To hundreds 
it still is. As one authority aptly phrased it, "Siberia 
is at once Russia's reservoir and its cesspool." 
Today, Siberia is Russia's Land of Promise. 



Visualize a territory greater in breadth than this 
continent, but in about the same geographical position 
as that occupied by Canada and the northern part of 
the United States — to a line drawn west from Savan- 
nah. In the extreme north, picture an arctic waste; 
south of that, a wide timber belt; still further south 
and 400 miles wide — between latitudes 5$° and 57 ° — 
a black soil belt, with soil as black as that in Michigan ; 

227 



228 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

below that, reaches of prairie land tailing off to desert 
and salt lakes. 

Conceive a chain of low hills running north and south 
along the Atlantic seaboard, nearer than the Alle- 
ghanies, for Siberia does not start officially until one 
has gone 100 miles east of the Urals. About where 
Yellowstone National Park lies, locate a great inland 
sea and call it Lake Baikal. Due south from it sketch 
in a cluster of mountains, to be labeled the Altais. 

At about Louisville, Kentucky, start a river, run it 
north and call it the Irtish. At Kansas City start an- 
other, flow it north and call it the Tom. Let them 
meet at a point about where Sault Ste. Marie lies, and 
name the river thence to the Arctic the Obi. About at 
Denver start a fourth river and let it wander to the 
Arctic under the name of Yenesei. A little east of 
where you have placed Lake Baikal start a river and 
let it curve to the east and north, emptying in the 
Pacific north of where Vancouver stands. This is the 
Amur. Midway north of it, in the region of Calgary, 
Alberta, begin a sixth great river system and name it 
the Lena. 

You now have a rough conception of both the geo- 
graphical belts and the larger waterways. All the 
rivers either flow north directly or eventually flow 
in that direction. The Irtish, Tom and Yenesei drain 
prairie lands in the south, wheat lands in the middle 
course and timber lands in the northern reaches. The 
Amur, flowing for the greater part of its course in 
an eastward direction, drains a valley rich in wheat 
soil and minerals. The Lena is banked with alluvial 
gold fields. 

Conceive this region as it was 400 years ago, in- 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 229 

habited only by nomadic tribes with much the same 
mixture of peaceful and warpath habits as our Amer- 
ican Indians. Visualize a band of f reebooting Cossacks 
trickling over the Urals, fighting their way through 
forest and over prairie, 5000 miles eastward to the 
Great Ocean. See, then, a thin road thread its way 
from the Urals to the Pacific. Mark it here and there 
with little stockaded forts. Watch the people who 
come east on that road — courtiers, dissenters, nobles, 
murderers, thieves, a handful of settlers. 

About where Pittsburg is, place a dot and call it 
Tcheliabinsk. Where Cleveland lies locate another 
and call it Omsk; about at Chicago find another to be 
called Tomsk; at Gardiner, Montana, locate Irkutsk; 
and about where the northern boundary-line of Cali- 
fornia bleeds off into the Pacific, place Vladivostok. 

Brush away 400 years and run a double-tracked rail- 
road due east from the Urals to the Pacific : the Trans- 
Siberian. Draw another along the course of the Amur 
to the Pacific and then south to Vladivostok : the Amur 
Railway. 

During 1916 there were opened for traffic three new 
lines, as follows: 

The Altai Railway: The line is 514 miles in length 
and runs from Novo-Nicolaievsk to Semipalatinsk, a 
trade center on the upper Irtish River, connecting the 
fertile regions in the foot-hills of the Altais with the 
mineral lands farther on. As yet the Altai gold and 
silver deposits have been poorly worked, since machin- 
ery and the means of transporting it are both lacking. 
For example, there are over 3000 silver deposits known 
and surveyed in the Altais of which less than 30 have 



230 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

been worked. The same situation obtains in the case 
of the working of reef gold and other minerals. 

The Kulundin Railway: a line serving the region 
between the Altai Railroad and the Irtish River. It 
runs south from Tartarsky on the Trans-Siberian 120 
miles east of Omsk, and drops south to Slavgorod, 200 
miles. This is the first line to tap the steppes of the 
western governments. It runs through fertile grazing 
and wheat lands. 

The Kolchugino Railway: designed to tap the Kuz- 
netsk coal fields, the richest of all Russian coal deposits, 
lying south of the Trans-Siberian R. R. about 300 miles 
from where Tomsk is situated. 

In addition, there has been completed and opened 
during the past five years the new northern main line 
of the Trans-Siberian running from Petrograd to 
Tumen and south to Omsk and an extension from 
Ekaterinburg to Kurgan on the Trans-Siberian, lines 
that tap the resources of the northwestern steppes. 

There, roughly, is an idea of the basis on which the 
Russian Land of Promise is developing. Gone is the 
old picture of snow and ice and fettered exiles and 
hungry wolves. . . . The Trans-Siberian express even 
carries a gymnasium car in which travelers can find suf- 
ficient exercise to keep them fit during the twelve-day 
journey across Asia. Up on the Amur at Blagowest- 
chensk, you buy shoes made in Brockton, Mass., from a 
clerk who remembers "Little OP Broadway" and pines 
for Herald Square. The farmers thereabouts use Amer- 
ican plows and harvesters, and the woman who can- 
not afford a Singer Sewing Machine is in a poor way. 

To this regenerate land between 1890, when the 
Trans-Siberian was being built, and 1900, went no 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 231 

less than 2,000,000 souls. In 1908 the figure for the 
year reached 758,000. In 1913 — the latest figures 
available — a cool million of them crossed the Urals 
and threw in their lot with the alleged wastes of snow 
and ice. 

And here lies the answer to the situation we saw 
in the statistics for emigration quoted in Chapter III. 
When the Russian wants to find a new land and a new 
life he goes to Siberia. From the handful of Cossacks 
has grown up a population of 11,500,000, nine mil- 
lions of which are settled on the steppes of Western 
Siberia. The native tribes that used to wander about 
the vast regions pillaging and snatching their food 
where they could find it, are now out-numbered eight 
to one. Siberia has ceased being a cesspool and has 
become a mighty reservoir. 



11 

In the short space of a chapter it is difficult to con- 
dense all the facts about a region one and a half times 
as large as the United States. I have done it at length 
elsewhere. 1 Here we can only touch on the most 
salient features of the country and sketch the broad 
lines of its' development. 

First, we must rid ourselves of the idea that Siberia 
is a gigantic, wolf-ridden, ice-locked prison-house. To 
be sure, during the war Russia has shipped her captives 
to Siberia where they stay with scarcely any guarding, 
the legends about the place being enough to prevent 
the men from straying far away from camp. In a 

1 Through Siberia, an Empire in the Making. Written with Bas- 
sett Digby. New York, 19 12. 



232 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

military respect alone Siberia is a prison land. She 
has her own jails where she takes care of her own crim- 
inals, and in the north are exile stations where men 
condemned for life are interned, but as a general dump- 
ing ground for the criminal output of All the Russias, 
Siberia has long since resigned the post. 

In 1900 the good folk got together and made it very 
plain to those in authority at Petersburg that they 
didn't intend permitting their land to be made the 
world's largest jail. They had other plans for it. 
Since that day no criminal exiles have been shipped 
to Siberia and, save for the deportations consequent 
on the Revolution of 1905, comparatively few adminis- 
trative exiles. In fact, most of the administrative 
exiles whose terms had not elapsed at the beginning 
of the war were permitted to return to Russia, and 
many of them have already laid down their lives for 
the very government against which they revolted ; many 
are still to be found in the trenches, in the hospitals 
and on the trains doing yeoman's service. 

In all fairness to the facts, it must be acknowledged 
that Siberia is better off to-day for its 400 years' har- 
boring of political exiles, despite the hosts of crim- 
inals who also were shipped there. Imagine what 
would be the status of the population, if for 400 years 
we had sent into permanent residence west of the Mis- 
sissippi, one-tenth of our best intellectual and cultured 
men and women, together with the riff-raff of our towns 
and cities. Siberia to-day bears the traces of those 
exiles — more of the intellectual than the criminal. In 
a measure this is what has given Siberia its forward- 
looking spirit. 

The picture of eternal snow and ice is likewise an 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 233 

exaggeration. The climate of Siberia, or, to be more 
precise, the climates of Siberia are approximately the 
same as the climates of the same comparative belts in 
America. The temperature, however, runs to extremes. 
Along the black soil belt, for example, the thermometer 
will drop to 30 ° below in January and rise to the dizzy 
height of 11 5 above in August. In this region spring 
and autumn scarcely exist. Two weeks after the snow 
had melted I used to walk mile on mile across the 
steppes and through the taiga (virgin forests) with 
the iris up to my knees, the fields and woods pur- 
pling with them as far as the eye could reach. In Si- 
beria the cold is a very dry cold, comparable to that 
in our Dakotas, and is often accompanied by winds. 
In summer the same winds drive dust storms that make 
country roads and many city streets almost impassable. 
Against such emergencies the city streets are regularly 
sprinkled. This last fact may seem irrelevant; I men- 
tion it merely because it sounds so delightfully incon- 
gruous with Siberia. 

A third point to remember is that the Siberian is 
very much up and coming. He stands in relation to 
the Russian somewhat as the Westerner does to us — 
a bit quicker in step, more liberal and brisk in thought, 
personally ambitious and independent. In Siberia 
they do not ask you who your grandfather was or 
what he did — for obvious reasons. Each man is much 
on his own, and even the police there seem to have 
respect for personal liberties. In some centers there 
is still a flavor of the vermilion life that made 'Frisco 
famous once on a day; in others there is brisk trade; 
in others — Tomsk especially — there is high regard for 
intellectual attainments and popular education. 



234 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

To all intents and purposes the commercial life of 
the country is spread along the lines of the railroads, 
the Trans-Siberian mainly. It is unfair to the country, 
however, to judge it solely from what one sees along 
that belt, especially if one sees it only from the win- 
dows of the Trans-Siberian express or learns of it from 
legends swapped by drummers in the cafe car. 

Not long since, American students of Russia were re- 
galed by a book written by a traveler who had seen 
Siberia mainly from the car window and had drawn 
from what she saw and heard some fearsome morals. 
There was the scandal about the school girls — how they 
were accustomed to haunt the cafes in nothing but their 
gymnasium suits. The reader visualized bloomered 
maidens in bare arms and barer legs and altogether 
scanty attire, a little touch that made Siberian cafe 
life a relief after the dingy humdrum of Broadway. 
For a matter of fact, most school girls in Russia wear 
their gymnasium suits most of the time. It is a modest 
black or brown frock that comes to the boot-tops in a 
seemly Victorian manner, has a high collar and long 
sleeves. The majority of the girls would be far more 
attractive if they didn't wear this gymnasium suit, but 
then the Government requires it and it suffers from 
the fact that it takes its name from the Teutonized 
title for the Russian middle school — the gymnasium. 
And so fades another Siberian legend ! 

But to return to the Trans-Siberian Railway belt. 
For a greater part of the way — from the Urals almost 
to Lake Baikal — it cuts through the black soil region. 
To the north and south lie the timber and mining sec- 
tions and, in the western reaches, the cattle lands. 
When it reaches the region of Baikal and the Trans- 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 235 

baikalian ridge the biggest mining fields are tapped. 
Following the newly completed Amur Railway, wheat, 
timber and mineral lands are again brought into touch 
with their markets. 

Along the belts of these railroads are the big cities : 
Tcheliabinsk, a cattle town and an immigration dis- 
tributing center; Omsk, the hub of the butter, eggs, 
meat, and hide trade; Tomsk, a mining and intellectual 
center where are located the University of Tomsk and 
the Technology Institute; Crasnoyarsk, another wheat 
and mining town ; Irkutsk, the administrative and min- 
ing capital ; Stretensk, at the headwaters of the Shilka 
and Amur, a mining outpost; Blagowestchensk, where 
mining, wheat, education, murder and fine shops all do 
a flourishing trade; and finally Vladivostok, "Queen 
of the East," the great port on the Pacific and Rus- 
sia's fortress facing Japan, thirty-six hours away across 
the waters to the East. 

Thus the western half of Siberia may be said to be 
devoted to wheat and cattle; the central part to min- 
ing, and the eastern half to mining and agriculture. 
These divisions, of course, are very rough, and the 
reader had better consult a map of the country and 
study out from the geographical and physical lay of 
the land the products naturally pertaining to each sec- 
tion. 

Statistics may also help to picture the possibilities of 
this vast region. 

The annual overturn from eggs alone totals $45,- 
000,000, which represents but 40% of the entire out- 
put, since the lack of cold storage plants reduces the 
value of sound eggs to that proportion; moreover, the 



236 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

scale of prices is much lower in Siberia than in Amer- 
ica. 1 

In 1911 the butter industry turned out 16,000,000 
pounds, valued at $5,000,000. This was the product 
of 550 butter-making artels with a membership of 120,- 
000. Of course, there was a great deal of butter made 
in addition to these figures, which represent only the 
export trade for 1911. 

Of the cattle exported in 1911 there were 65,000 
head valued at $1,250,000. Cereals valued at $15,- 
000,000 were exported in the same year. Hides were 
valued at $3,000,000; wool was worth $2,000,000. 
Incidentally, it is reckoned that there are 16 sheep 
and 14 pigs to every 100 of population in Siberia. 

The copper output in 1911 reached 3,780 tons, and 
the coal, 1,986,346 tons. Later figures on gold are 
available; they show the product for 1913 to be 
120,280 pounds (3,007 poods of Russian measurement, 
and a pood is equivalent roughly to 40 pounds). 



in 

The needs of a country like Siberia are mainly con- 
nected with equipment. Nature is bountiful and the 
inhabitants have only to take advantage of her gen- 
erosity. The country is as yet young, and the soil 
has scarcely been more than scratched. 

There are wheatfields that eventually will outstrip 
anything in the world. It has been estimated that the 
black soil belt of Siberia, if properly cultivated, would 

*In March, when the rivers were frozen tight as a drum and the 
land was covered with snow, I bought fresh laid eggs from Siberian 
farmers for 12 copecks (6 cents) a dozen. When they discovered I 
was an American, they raised the price — to 8 cents. 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 237 

furnish food enough for five times the present popu- 
lation of European Russia. In order to handle 
the grain from this region, the Government has started 
to construct a series of 84 grain elevators along the 
lines of the railways. 

Before Siberia can become a vital factor in the 
world's markets, she must develop along two logically 
connected lines — railroads and population. Capital 
will be required to construct and equip these railroads 
with up-to-date stock. The present butter, egg and 
meat trades, for example, use only 1300 cold storage 
cars and there are but five cold storage centers along 
the line of the Trans-Siberian — only a fraction of what 
is actually required. Until more cold storage facili- 
ties are provided Siberia can bring only a small part 
of her perishable foodstuffs to the markets of the 
Continent. 

The Government is keenly alive to the railroad situa- 
tion. As we have seen, it has undertaken the construc- 
tion of several new lines, and has let permits for nine 
additional lines to syndicates. Work on these nine 
has been started and is progressing. They will be con- 
structed in the period 1917-22 with 1927 as an out- 
side date. These private-built lines are planned as 
follows : 

The South Siberian Railway: This will run from 
Omsk, across the Kirghiz steppes through Akmolinsk 
and, crossing the Irtish River at Pavlodar, will continue 
on through Slavgorod, the present terminus of the 
Kulundin Railway, to Barnaul, where it will connect 
with the Altai Railway system and the Kunzetsk- 
Barnual branch of the Kulchugino Railway. This 
line will provide another trunk system across the plains 



238 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

of Western Siberia, about 220 miles south of the pres- 
ent Trans-Siberian, and connect the railroads of Euro- 
pean Russia with Minusinsk. It will be 1000 miles 
long and in it provide an outlet for the products of 
the Khirgiz steppes and the rich agricultural districts 
along the upper Irtish and Obi Rivers and the mineral 
wealth of the foothills of the Amolinsk and Semipala- 
tinsk districts, which are especially rich in copper, lead 
and zinc ores. 

Akomolinsk-Spassky Copper Mines Railway: To 
connect the proposed South Siberian trunk line with 
the mineral areas to the south in the vicinity of the 
famous Spassky copper mines. 

Slavgorod-Semipalatinsk-Verny Railway: This line, 
which will connect Western Siberia with Central Asia, 
is to run south from Slavgorod, the terminus of the 
Kulundin Railway, to Semipalatinsk and thence, skirt- 
ing the foothills of the Altais, to Verny, the center of 
a very rich district south of Lake Balkhash. The total 
length will be 1000 miles. A. branch line is proposed 
to pass through the Altais to Kuldja on the other side 
of the Mongolian border. This will make Verny a rail- 
road and trade center for the great commerce of Mon- 
golia, which, under the Russian suzerainty, is being 
rapidly developed. Already a railway is being con- 
structed to Verny from a point on the Tashkent Rail- 
way in Russian Turkestan, thus connecting this terri- 
tory with the railroads of Western Siberia, and mak- 
ing possible the exchange of Siberian grain and other 
products with the semi-tropical products of Russian 
Turkestan and Central Asia. 

Petropavlovsk-Kokchetav Railway: Running south 
from the Trans-Siberian about a hundred miles to 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 239 

Kokchetav, this line will serve the steppe region there- 
abouts, and will enable the syndicates to connect up 
with other lines in the region for the transportation of 
mineral products to the south and east. 

Ekaterinburg-Kurgan Railway: This forms a north 
branch of the Trans-Siberian between the Petrograd- 
Tumen-Omsk line already constructed, and the main 
line of the Trans-Siberian. It is well under way. 

Achinsk-Yensysk Railway: This is to be projected 
from the Trans-Siberian trunk line northward to the 
headwaters of the Lena River, connecting up the Lena 
gold fields. 1 

In addition there are railroads projected which will 
further open up the northern reaches of Siberia — the 
Tiumen-Tomsk line, skirting the southern fringe of 
the timber belt, and a line north from Obdorsk on the 
lower Obi to a port on the Arctic Ocean, connecting 
up with an ice-free summer port. 



IV 

As in the case of the railroads, capital is also re- 
quired to equip the mines, to finance agricultural de- 
velopments and to foster manufacturing in the cities. 
There is some British capital in Siberian mining at 
present, a little American and a great deal of Ger- 
man. The resources of the various mining regions 
have barely been scratched. This is especially true of 
the Transbaikalian Mountains and the littoral of Lake 
Baikal where there are oil, coal, gold, iron, copper and 
zinc in quantities to repay development. The Lena 

1 This data and that on pages 229, 230 appeared in the Report of 
the Canadian Trade Commissioner in Russia. 



240 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

goldfields in the north can easily become another Klon- 
dike and so can the Altai Mountains in the south, while 
Baikal will eventually be another Baku. 

Siberia has but few factories, and there is a crying 
need for the establishment of more. "In metal manu- 
facturers and agricultural machinery, Siberia is but 
little inferior as a consumer to European Russia." 1 
The raw materials are at hand, and all the cities need 
are Chambers of Commerce alive to their opportunities 
to attract foreign and native capital. At present the 
manufactured goods have to be transported half across 
Asia. There is no reason why there should not be estab- 
lished in a city like Irkutsk a factory to make agricul- 
tural implements. It would be a central distributing 
point for the Western steppes and the Amur Valley. 
In the same way a Moscow fabric works might readily 
find a market for the output of a branch factory in 
Tomsk. As matters stand, print goods, linens and 
other fabrics, which are practically necessities of life 
in any nation, have to be transported the several thou- 
sands of miles across the Trans-Siberian. In the east- 
ern provinces Japan is fast capturing the print goods 
trade. 



Doubtless the development of Siberia will follow 
much the same lines as the growth of our West and 
of western Canada. The railroads already built and 
building, together with the vast waterways and the 
northern Arctic Sea route, will furnish contact with 
the markets and with civilization. It might speed mat- 
ters were the Russian Government to follow the prac- 

*The Russian Year Book for 1915, page 515. 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 241 

tice instituted here with good results — that of grant- 
ing the land contiguous to the railroad lines to those 
companies that construct the lines. 

As we have already seen, settlers are not wanting. 
Russia in Europe can easily spare another 11,000,000, 
and with this addition Siberia would still be far from 
crowded. 

The Government readily lends a hand to these new 
settlers in the Land of Promise. "A Russian peasant 
to-day can receive free transportation for himself and 
family, his flocks and his herds and everything that 
he hath, from his native village to a settlement in far- 
away Siberia. And there he will be given land and 
loaned a grant for a year's farming expenses. 

"Each male is given forty and one-half acres, care 
being taken that the region to which he is sent com- 
pares favorably in general characteristics with the land 
he had known in Russia. No taxes are levied for the 
first three years, and only one-half of the taxes for 
the second three. Service in the army is not compul- 
sory among immigrants until the end of the first three 
years, that is to say, until they have cleared their fields 
and built their houses. Moreover, the Government 
sees that there is to each family at least one man. 
Should the older son die while the younger is in the 
ranks, the younger son is dismissed from active service 
and sent back to the farm. If the peasant is absolutely 
destitute, the Government will help in furnishing farm 
utensils, payment being set for a later date and on 
the installment plan; will give him seed, and, should 
the first crop be poor, provide him with the cash equiv- 
alent. He is allowed as much timber as he needs for 
the construction of his house and barn. Moreover, in 



242 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

order that the farmers may learn modern agricul- 
tural and dairy methods, the Government has set 
up dairy schools and agricultural instruction sta- 
tions and offers series of prizes to be competed for." 1 
Like any other settler in a new land, he must bear priva- 
tions, loneliness and the capriciousness of the climate, 
problems which, of course, can only be solved by the 
individual himself. 

Were the Jew an agriculturist, Russia might well 
solve her troublesome Semitic problems by abolishing 
the Pale in Europe and permitting the Jews to emi- 
grate to Siberia. Unfortunately, the Jew is not a good 
farmer; even here in America, where every effort has 
been made to induce the Jews of the crowded cities 
to take up agricultural life, the results have been far 
from encouraging. The Jew is first and last a middle- 
man. Were Russia to open Siberia to unrestricted 
occupation of Jews, the Siberian cities would soon face 
the tenement problem with the attendant filth, crime 
and crowding that are found in New York, London, 
Warsaw, Kiev, in fact, in any place where Jews con- 
gregate. There are a number of Jews in Siberia to- 
day, so many that the country has earned the sobriquet 
of "The Jews' Paradise," but they are usually of the 
better classes such as are permitted to dwell outside 
the Pale in European Russia. 

Profiting by some of the mistakes made in our West, 
Siberia can eventually become a region of immense 
development and of immense material returns to those 
who settle there. The cooperative societies, if prop- 
erly managed, will avoid the economic mistakes that 

1 Through Siberia, an Empire in the Making. Richardson Wright 
and Bassett Digby. Pages 102-3. 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 243 

have blighted some sections of our West. Thus, in 
the state of Oklahoma, 67% of the farmers are ten- 
ants. Wall Street controls the finances of the locality, 
and the farmers are only just now awakening to the 
necessity for cooperation. In other words, Siberia can 
be an agricultural country owned and operated by the 
people who live there and till the soil, instead of the 
chattel land of a group of bankers. The situation 
among the agricultural populace seems to indicate the 
probability of this promising development; at least, 
there are as yet no wealthy land-owners in Siberia out- 
side of the Tsar and the Royal Family (the immense 
grants of land that used to obtain have been stopped 
by law), and the multimillionaire ranch-owner is un- 
known, whereas the cooperative societies are very nu- 
merous and very active. 

Beside being a region of great material returns, Si- 
beria can be to Russia a Land of Promise in that it 
will afford a legitimate outlet for the energies of new 
generations. We in America are apt to judge the situ- 
ation in Russia merely on the basis of politics, corrupt 
politics. Yet the real facts of the case are quite dif- 
ferent. Of the 182,000,000 souls in the Russian Em- 
pire, fully 175,000,000 live in European Russia, which 
is by no means capable of sustaining life and affording 
means of a livelihood for so large a number. While 
the average density is only 20 to the square mile, the 
figure is high enough to cause active emigration, since 
the population of Russia increases at the rate of 3,000,- 
000 per annum. 

Congestion of this sort spells difficulty in gaining 
a livelihood. It breeds mobs. It develops discontent. 
Now, the great problem that faces Russia is not how 



244 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

much voice in their own government shall the people 
of Russia be given, but how shall a population of 
over 175,000,000 be fed and given a means of earn- 
ing a living. Set the same situation here in America, 
and democracy would play but a small part in the solu- 
tion. To repeat the findings of a previous chapter, 
the greatest evil Russia has suffered has been that her 
people have not had enough to keep them busy, and 
that their Government, in its liquor monopoly, put 
temptation in the path of workers and idlers alike. In 
some regions the climate has also reduced the oppor- 
tunity for work — long winters used to spell idleness. 
On the other hand, the abolition of the vodka traffic 
and the growth of industries have solved some of the 
difficulty. Russian industries are not confined to the 
cities, but are largely situated in the country, so that 
the country folk in the immediate vicinity will have 
sufficient to keep them busy all the time the factories 
are working. 

On the other hand, the new agencies now tending 
toward the development of opportunities for the re- 
generation of the peasant will only make competition 
among the laborers in European Russia all the more 
keen and the Government must attract to other regions 
of the Empire the overflow of her working populace. 

Siberia and Central Asia are the two most promis- 
ing regions, and they are already booming with the 
alacrity of a Western town. They not only offer op- 
portunities for work — they impel work: the pioneer 
must either conquer the elements or they conquer him 
and he goes out fantee. When these regions arrive 
at a plane of economic power which commands respect, 
they will dictate their terms to Petrograd, just as they 



THE RUSSIAN LAND OF PROMISE 245 

have once or twice already dictated them, just as the 
West and Southwest of the States to-day dictate to the 
White House. 

Those who have the future of Russia at heart know 
that their Land of Promise lies in Siberia. And with 
all the fervid wisdom of a previous American genera- 
tion, they are counseling their rising generations : "Go 
East, young man, go East !" 



CHAPTER XIII 

Russia's manifest destinies 

HE would be a rash man, indeed, who would 
attempt to draw the map of Europe as it 
will be ten years hence. Diplomats and 
generals are capricious cartographers. Natural bar- 
riers no longer play the deciding role they once did in 
the establishment of frontiers. Modern warfare and 
its consequent treaty obligations disregard mountain 
ridge and swelling river. Yet the same forces that 
tear up one map, draw another. These are the forces 
of finance, of economic pressure and of national ideals. 
Russia's points of contact with the world — the spots 
where her economic development, her finance, and the 
ideals of her people touch the schemes of other pow- 
ers — are in the Balkans, in Poland, Turkey, Persia and 
Manchuria. In Poland she meets with the Teuton 
forces. In Turkey she touches the Teutonized Turk- 
ish forces. In Persia she is contiguous to British 
spheres of influence. In Manchuria she meets the 
spreading streams of Japanese. In the Balkans she 
touches the Germano-Austrian scheme of empire. Dur- 
ing the course of the war each of these points has 
been brought into greater or less prominence, and each 
has played its part in shaping the eventual destinies 
of the great Slav Empire. 

246 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 247 



Of the warring powers, one alone has pleaded either 
the financial or the economic excuse. Germany claimed 
"a place in the sun" — a place for her alleged bursting 
masses of population. In addition, lured on by the 
Junkers who masqueraded as moral leaders, the Ger- 
man people had come to believe that their divine call- 
ing was to carry German Kultur to whatsoever less 
enlightened land their economic conquests might give 
control. 

In cold fact, as the world has since learned, these 
seemingly idealistic schemes meant nothing more than 
an eventual territorial expansion westward to gain 
further command of more North Sea littoral, even 
though that movement meant the subjugation and ab- 
sorption of Holland and Belgium, and the Teutonizing 
of that strip of Europe and Asia extending from the 
North Sea to the head of the Persian Gulf — Berlin 
to Bagdad. This latter movement covered an area 
inhabited by 50,000,000 non-Germans, and necessi- 
tated the obliteration of the smaller Balkan states. It 
meant Deutschland ilber alles — ilber Bulgarian and 
Serbian and Austrian and Hungarian and Rumanian 
and Greek and Turk and Armenian. This was the 
crux of the European situation, and so sensitively ad- 
justed was the state of affairs that the murder of the 
Austrian Grand Duke Ferdinand precipitated a world- 
wide conflict. 

The details of what happened in the four years and 
in the forty-eight hours immediately preceding the 
declaration of war on Russia have been written of at 
greater length and in more detail than this chapter can 



248 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

consider. Summarizing the situation from both sides, 
it is evident that Germany was fully prepared for war 
with Russia — as she was equally ready for war with 
France — but that she did not expect Russia to enter 
the conflict. Germany was confident that her influ- 
ence at Petrograd would withstand any amount of 
pressure from the people's side or from the side of Rus- 
sia's allies. Moreover, Russia's power in the Balkan 
States had been gradually waning — at least so Ger- 
many thought. 

Years before, the Kaiser had proclaimed himself 
the friend of the Turkish people, and had ever since 
seen to it that the Turkish Army was officered with 
men from Berlin. Deliberately, openly, Germany was 
buying the favor of Russia's traditional enemy. 

On the thrones of Rumania and Bulgaria the Kaiser 
had succeeded in placing German kings, and had mar- 
ried his sister to Constantine of Greece. 

In all these developments the Kaiser's moves were 
obvious. The man-in-the-street knew about these af- 
fairs from his daily papers, and, if he had two grains 
of wit, he also knew why Russia was so intent on pre- 
serving the individuality and independence of the 
smaller Balkan States; that was her role in her alli- 
ances with France and England. 

While Germany was openly laying her plan for the 
Berlin-to-Bagdad move, she was also secretly getting 
her hand into the foreign affairs of Russia. In fact, 
for six years, 1910-1916, a great many of Russia's dip- 
lomatic moves were directed from Berlin. It was in the 
period 1910-1916 that Sazanov was the Russian For- 
eign Minister, and although under him Russia's foreign 
developments were vast indeed, they were also prac- 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 249 

tically developments in the favor of Germany. It 
may have been that Sazanov worked unwittingly, that 
he was not aware of the ultimate dreams of the Prus- 
sian Empire. Such things are wholly possible. Nev- 
ertheless, he played into the hands of the Germans, 
and Russia is paying the price. According to M. 
Sazanov, Austria was planning to overthrow the 
status quo in the Balkans and to establish her own 
hegemony there. To offset this, he fostered the Serbo- 
Bulgarian Agreement (signed February 29th, 1912), 
which he expected to be at once a checkmate to both 
Turkey and Austria. Then came the second Balkan 
War, which left the Balkans divided and an easy prey 
to Teuton dreams. When Russia supported the claim 
of Rumania to a strip of Bulgarian territory, Bulgaria 
naturally turned against Russia, leaving Rumania and 
Greece apparently on the fence, and Serbia alone 
amenable to Russia's dictates. When Serbia refused 
to back down to the Austrian ultimatum, the whole 
diplomatic house of cards in the Near East went crash- 
ing to the ground. 

The war came to Russia at a moment of great in- 
dustrial development, at a time when the Empire was 
beginning to show signs of political and commercial 
advancement. The Russian people did not expect 
the war, for the simple reason that they had not looked 
upon the Germans as their foes. So great had been 
German influence in Petrograd that newspapers print- 
ing criticisms of German methods in Russia were 
quickly censored out of existence. 

In diplomatic circles there was the influence of 
Sazanov and of Baron Rosen. The latter will be re- 



250 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

membered by Americans as the Russian Ambassador 
to Washington. By Russians he will be remembered 
as the very clever diplomat who turned Japanese mili- 
tary victory into diplomatic defeat over the long green 
table at Portsmouth in 1904. At that time and ever 
afterward he has shown himself to be a friend of Ger- 
man interests in the Near East. In a paper dated May 
13, 1913, Baron Rosen counseled Russia to make a 
total concession to Germany's scheme of development 
in Europe. He suggested that Russia drop her dream 
of a Slavonic Empire and call a halt on proselyting 
in the Balkans and against Austria-Hungary in the 
Slav provinces of that nation. Further, he advised 
Russia to give up the plan of ever gaining control of 
Constantinople and to consent to the Dardanelles' be- 
ing neutralized. He even went so far as to say that 
Russia should withdraw from both her alliances with 
France and Great Britain, recognize the right of Ger- 
many to expand to the Persian Gulf and over Holland 
and Belgium if need were, and for Russia to turn her 
attention solely to her interests in the Far East. 
Sazanov followed the lines that has been summarized 
in this paper; under him in 1912 Russia succeeded in 
establishing her suzerainty over Mongolia by the terms 
of the Russo-Mongolian Agreement and Protocol signed 
October 21, 1912, and in 1915 occurred an exchange 
of territory in Manchuria that was further indicative 
of the fact that the path of Russian development lay, 
according to Germany's dreams, in the Far East. This 
scheme of development also links up logically with the 
growth of the Russian Empire eastward — a convenience 
for Germany, to say the least. 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 251 

II 

In the early days of 1915 there occurred a little 
diplomatic shift in Manchuria that, at any other time, 
would have turned the courts of Europe inside out. As 
matters stand, the world in general and the United 
States in particular are just beginning to appreciate 
what the movement presaged. 

In payment for munition assistance Russia first 
ceded Japan the northern half of the Island of 
Saghalin, the lower half having been given over to 
her by the Treaty of Portsmouth. By this Japan ac- 
quired valuable coal and iron mines. A short time 
later Japan was ceded the control of Manchuria up 
to Harbin. Let us see what that meant. 

Heretofore the Russian trains ran south from Har- 
bin to Chang-Chun on a branch of the Chinese Eastern 
Railway, the name under which Russia operates across 
Central Manchuria and links up the western and cen- 
tral stretches of the Trans-Siberian trunk line with the 
shorter line crossing the Maritime Provinces to Vladi- 
vostok. Down this Harbin-Chang-Chun line were 
scattered the little turreted forts, each with its quota 
of Cossacks, its threatening machine guns and its wire- 
less connections with Petrograd. Travelers on that 
line when reaching Chang-Chun merely walked across 
the station platform and entered Japanese territory by 
boarding the trains of the South Manchurian Railway, 
the corporation under which Japan operates in the 
Liaotung Peninsula. Today the Japanese trains run 
into Harbin, and Russia does not start until the 
bulbous railway concession at that city is reached. 

It is easy enough to dismiss this as payment of a 



252 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

debt accrued by the war. But, for a matter of fact, 
Russia's concession to Japan in Manchuria represents 
a vital international change which will radically affect 
the situation in the Far East and, in turn, involve the 
prestige and power of other nations there. 

Twelve years ago Russia was smarting from her de- 
feat at Port Arthur and Mukden. But she was by 
no means finally defeated. Roosevelt's offer of media- 
tion came at a time when Russia was about to turn 
the tables on Japan, an interference which the Russian 
people have not forgotten and which accounts for the 
Douma's quick and conclusive reply to the peace over- 
tures of President Wilson. In the years that followed 
the Treaty of Portsmouth, Russia and Japan kept very 
close watch on each other in Manchuria. Every up- 
rising, every epidemic, every attack by native brigands 
was taken as an excuse for throwing along the line 
of the Chinese Eastern Railway a fresh regiment of 
troops. In the spring of 1910-11 Russia had half a 
million men of all branches of the service east of Lake 
Baikal, and along the lines of the Chinese Eastern 
Railway and the Amur Railway she was building sub- 
stantial barracks to accommodate enormous bodies of 
troops. For her part Japan was doing the same. She 
was calculated to have, at the beginning of the war, 
several regiments more than were permitted her accord- 
ing to her agreement with Russia. 

In these years the commercial jealousies of Russia 
and Japan were anything but covert. A traveler 
through that neighborhood who kept his eyes open 
would have judged, and rightly, that the region was 
due for another war in about five years. In the north, 
Russia was fast completing the Amur Railway, which 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 253 

extended over the shoulder of North Manchuria, and 
had surveyed a line to run south from Blagowestchensk 
on the Amur River to Tsitsitar on the Chinese Eastern 
Railway. Meantime, Russia has also sufficiently con- 
solidated her control over Mongolian trade to justify 
the establishment of a suzerainty. The situation re- 
solved itself into Russia and Japan's checkmating each 
other in the northern part of the Far East. 

Instead of conflict in that region came the European 
War — Russia's Balkan point of contact with the Euro- 
pean powers broke into flame. Japan went into Kiao- 
Chou, took the German Pacific Islands and wiped Ger- 
many off the map in the Far East. With this accom- 
plished, she became little more than a neutral. She was 
assigned the duty of policing the Far East, and of an- 
swering what she was told to answer when the neutral 
powers sent out their peace overtures. Her people have 
since waxed fat on munition orders, and her Govern- 
ment has acquired in Central Manchuria further lands 
in which can be settled some of the teeming millions 
of Hondo, Shikoku and Kyushu. 

in 

Let us now look at another point of contact; the 
Trans-Caucasus, where Russia touches Turkey and 
Persia and the outer fringe of the British Empire. 

In the winter of 1915-16, when the Grand Duke 
Nicholas had been beaten back before the onrush of 
Mackensen and Hindenburg past Warsaw, the world 
was suddenly puzzled by an order relieving him of 
command on the Russian western front and shipping 
him to the Caucasus as Governor General. At the time 



254 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION . 

it was interpreted as a mark of the Tsar's personal dis- 
favor, and from that day on the Tsar was at the front. 
There were credible rumors, circulated by the press, 
to the effect that the Grand Duke was planning to 
usurp the throne and that the pro-German forces in 
Petrograd had caused his dismissal because he had pur- 
sued his attacks with too great vigor. 

At the same time Britain was pushing her Meso- 
potamian campaign, reaching northward from the Per- 
sian Gulf for the relief of Kut-el-Amara, which unhap- 
pily came too late. She was also throwing away the 
lives of countless men on Gallipoli. Her scheme of 
attacking Turkey from both sides was a logical enough 
procedure. 

On the other hand, it must be remembered that for 
a century England has stood in the way of Russia's 
attaining Constantinople and the Dardanelles for fear 
that this possession would mean the eventual encroach- 
ment upon India and Persia. The campaign up from 
the Persian Gulf may be interpreted as part of Eng- 
land's maneuvers against Turkey; it may also be in- 
terpreted as a movement to safeguard that region from 
Russian approach. 

At another point on these pages 1 1 have said that the 
Slavophil dream of extending the Russian Empire un- 
til it shall be contiguous to the land of another Chris- 
tian power in Asia is by no means dead. Russia is 
spending vast sums to open up her South Siberian and 
Central Asiatic provinces with railroads. The Trans- 
Caspian region promises to be one of the richest wheat 
fields in the world. One of the first things the Grand 
Duke asked for after reaching his new post was half 

1 See page 97. 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 255 

a million roubles to be devoted to planting the rich 
land acquired from the Turks. Frankly, Russia in- 
tends to put the Caucasus and the Trans-Caspian 
regions, together with Siberia, on the commercial map. 
When the Grand Duke was relieved of his command he 
had by no means proved himself a failure. He had 
brought his army intact through a long retreat — an 
accomplishment that all great tacticians from Caesar 
down regarded as being even more difficult than win- 
ning an open victory in the field. Granted that he 
had been driven back and that Poland was in the hands 
of the Prussians, .Russia still possessed intact the bulk 
of her forces, forces that Brusiloff later used for his 
advance in the summer of 1916. The transfer of the 
Grand Duke to the Caucasus cannot be interpreted as 
a military rebuke ; for it meant that he was given com- 
mand of a vital point on Russia's frontier. To him it 
was entrusted to harry the Turks from the rear, to 
cooperate with the British, and at the same time to 
guide the British movements in a manner that would 
be most advantageous to Russia. 

Of late it would seem that Great Britain has become 
perfectly amenable to the idea of Russia's possessing 
Constantinople — in fact, Trepov, the Prime Minister 
during the last few months of 1916, frankly stated that 
the Dardanelles and Constantinople were Russia's 
share of the spoils. 

Since the war opened, England and the English have 
arrived at an appreciation of Russia and the Russians. 
The almost sacrosanct manner in which Russians are 
regarded in England to-day must amuse those who 
have followed the course of the two powers during 
the past twenty-five years. Russia is England's pres- 



256 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

ent fad, just as twenty years ago Germany was her 
fad. Doubtless this amity between the two peoples 
will last for many years, but the suddenness of its 
appearance should not be permitted to cloud the facts 
in the case. And the facts are these: England is 
friendly to Russia only when it is convenient to be so. 
When Russia steps on England's toes or England steps 
on Russia's, there will be the same showing of teeth 
and the same rattling of sabers that there has been 
in the past. Russia is looking out for her own inter- 
ests, just as Britain is looking out for hers. She is 
keeping an eye on England in Central Asia, she is also 
laying her own plans in the Far East. 



IV 

It is only right that England should be proud of 
the manner in which she has served humanity and main- 
tained the balance of power in the Far East. She has 
done more than any other nation to develop that region ; 
she has put China on her feet — so far as China would 
permit her. She has maintained peace there and made 
possible the trafficking of other nations. In this en- 
deavor she had the cooperation of France in the south, 
the advantage of the presence of the United States in 
the Philippines, and in the north the vigorous support 
of Japan. But her claims over the Far East have not 
gone undisputed. The establishment of Kiao-chou was 
Germany's answer to it, and Russia's suzerainty over 
Mongolia and her recent concessions to Japan have 
been others. In short, Russia is making a bid for the 
control of that part of the Far East to which she is 
directly related — North Manchuria, Mongolia and the 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 257 

western regions of China that can be connected with 
her Central Asiatic provinces by rail across the conti- 
nent. Japan has taken the southern parts of Man- 
churia and also Kiao-Chou, and is repelling every effort 
on the part of American financiers to develop the rail- 
roads and other means of internal communications of 
China. Russia and Japan control the northern Far 
East. Let no one mistake this. 

In addition to her just claim to commercial expan- 
sion in the Far East, the Russian development is laid 
on the ground of temperament. Being partly of Asiatic 
origin, she understands the Asiatic, knows how to 
handle him, can look at matters from his viewpoint. 
Moreover, as the Orthodox Church does not proselytize, 
she can avoid those clashes of moral and religious 
propaganda that constantly disturb the serene course of 
Asiatic life and society. 

As I have tried to show, the idea of Russia and Eng- 
land's being eternally friendly is quite impossible. 
While England unquestionably holds Russia in the 
palm of her financial hand, it is very much to be 
doubted if Russia will permit herself to be crushed in 
that commercial hand after the war, as she permitted 
herself to be held by Germany after the Russo-Japanese 
conflict. In her agreement with Japan, Russia holds a 
trump card against Britain, and she will hold it to play 
at the right moment. 

The Russo-Japanese Entente is a situation that the 
United States might well watch closely. It has many 
possible outcomes, some of them most disastrous to us 
and to the world's peace. 

Looking ahead ten, twenty, thirty years, we can see 
several arrangements of the world's powers: (1) Ger- 



258 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

many, Russia and Japan, controlling a great sweep of 
territory from the North Sea to the Yellow, and oppos- 
ing France, England, Italy and the United States. 
(2) England, France, Russia and Italy and the United 
States opposing Germany and German expansion. (3) 
Germany, England, France, Italy and the United 
States as against Russia and Japan — the East and the 
West of the world. I would not prophesy that any 
one of these will come to pass. I merely suggest them 
as possible combinations, and the reader who likes to 
dream in terms of empires can do so on this basis to 
his heart's content. 

It were futile for the United States to talk of form- 
ing a League to Enforce Peace without having also 
to consider what part she will play in it. And if she 
plays a part she will have to give up the worn-out 
counsels against "entangling alliances," counsels ut- 
tered generations before the Trans-Atlantic giants were 
conceived and before the Deutschland made her unbe- 
lievable undersea journey from Bremen to Baltimore. 
Just as no man liveth to himself, so no nation liveth 
to itself. The time has come when the United States 
must decide what part she is going to play in the 
world's work beside making money from it. In the 
chaos of international relations that now exists, we are 
sure of only one thing — the Russo-Japanese Entente is 
daily gaining power in the northern part of the Far 
East. Pacifists and the Middle West to the contrary, 
it is a situation well worth watching. We must make 
our bid for Russian friendship, we must maintain cor- 
dial relations with England and France which hold 
Russia in fee, for, if a conflict between the East and 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 259 

West does come to pass, we will not be permitted to 
wash our hands of the whole matter. 



Russia's other point of contact with alien powers is 
Poland. 

Poland has ever been the scapegoat of the nations. 
She has been battled with and battled over, and 
whether victorious or defeated she eventually has had 
to pay a terrible price for very existence itself. The 
German paper Kingdom of Poland and its bombastic 
establishment in the fall of 1916 was too crudely car- 
ried out to deceive even the most stupid. Germany 
needed troops and workers, and, in exchange for as 
many fighting and working units as the German Gov- 
ernor General could assemble, Poland was given some 
famous scraps of paper. When that land is drained 
dry, and if the German power still exists, Germany will 
doubtless take the unfortunate country for her own — 
at least as much of it as she has wrested from Russia. 

The German charges of Russian atrocities in Poland 
and the Russian countercharges amount to nothing 
more than the pot calling the kettle black, with more 
proof on the Russian side since she can call in Bel- 
gium to witness the terrible methods of the German 
military machine. The same can be said of the treat- 
ment each of these nations gave Poland previous to 
the war. In her Polish provinces Germany ruled with 
just as strict a hand as Russia ruled in hers. There 
was the same attempt to subjugate the people and to 
assimilate them. But Germany had carried her 
methods even farther — she had commercially invaded 



26o THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

and taken possession of Russian Poland five years be- 
fore the European War blazed up. The rapid indus- 
trial growth of Poland during those five years was 
due mainly to German capital and to the concessions 
made to German migration by Count Witte. Russia 
policed Poland, Germany administered its commerce. 
That was about how the situation stood. The German 
pleas for making Poland a buffer state were the very 
fabric and tissue of hypocrisy. Germany begged for 
one thing and was striving to accomplish the opposite. 
Poland was her gateway to Russia, and she made every 
possible use of that entrance. 

What will become of Poland is another of those 
prophecies that only a rash man or a fool would make 
categorically. The chaos of three years of war cannot 
be cleared away overnight; another generation must 
pass before we can know what Poland's destiny will be. 
There is still a great and noble spirit left in the Polish 
people — that would seem to be the one thing that the 
war has not obliterated in Poland! Hope springs 
eternal in the Polish heart. Noble traditions live on, 
and the Pole — German, Russian and Austrian alike — 
dreams of the day when Poland will emerge again, a 
knight in shining armor. 

Poland is one of history's answers to the question: 
"Can a nation ever be totally destroyed 1 ?" It may be 
divided, it may be subjugated, its fair lands may be 
laid waste and its women and children carried into 
captivity, but the ideals of a people are indestructible 
and war only makes their tissue firmer. Nations 
crumble and pass away because their people suffer 
financial degeneration of the soul. This Poland has 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 261 

never experienced. Suffering has bred in her the will 
to live. She has never been too proud to fight. 

It would be conducive to the peace of Europe were 
Poland "united, independent and autonomous." In 
this respect Petrograd concurs perfectly with President 
Wilson's views. Russia promised this to her provinces 
at the beginning of the war, and Germany gave it un- 
der economic pressure on her scraps of paper. But by 
a united Poland Russia means a Poland consisting of 
not only her provinces but the provinces now controlled 
by both Germany and Austria. Yet it is to be ques- 
tioned whether Austria and Germany will resign their 
fertile lands and rich manufacturing districts to any 
such Utopian plan. Surely it would work to the ad- 
vantage of all three nations concerned and to the peace 
of Europe, but that day is still far off. 

VI 

Russia's final point of contact is Turkey, and of all 
her possible avenues for reaching the ultimate Russian 
ideal, this one seems least obstructed. 

But why does Russia want Constantinople*? Why 
does she want the Dardanelles? 

Land is the last thing she wants. She has enough 
and plenty. Nor is her empire scattered over the seven 
seas, as is Britain's ; it is a continuous stretch from the 
Baltic to the Pacific, from the Arctic to the Caspian, 
one-sixth of the earth's land surface. 

Russia has suffered the loss of ten Polish provinces, 
inhabited by 12,000,000 people, the richest regions of 
the Empire, the Moscow and Vladimir Governments 
excepted. In compensation for this loss she looks to 



262 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

Constantinople — Constantinople, which will relieve 
her of the necessity of maintaining costly defenses 
along the Black Sea; Constantinople, which will give 
her a port open the year round; Constantinople, the 
dream of her people for centuries. Speaking of Rus- 
sia's aims in an address to the Russian armies issued 
December 25th, 1916, the Tsar said: "Russia's at- 
tainment of the tasks created by the war — regarding 
Constantinople and the Dardanelles, as well as the 
creation of a free Poland from all three of her now 
incomplete tribal districts — has not yet been guaran- 
teed." Trepov, speaking for the Russian people on 
his assumption of the portfolio of Prime Minister, said, 
"For more than a thousand years Russia has been reach- 
ing southward toward a free outlet on the open sea. 
This age-long dream, cherished in the hearts of the Rus- 
sian people, is now ready for realization. . . . 

"From the beginning of the war, wishing to spare 
human lives and suffering, we and our allies did our 
utmost to restrain Turkey from mad participation in 
hostilities. Turkey received formal assurances guaran- 
teeing her, in exchange for neutrality, the integrity of 
her territory and independence, and also conferring on 
her certain privileges and advantages. These efforts 
were in vain. Turkey surreptitiously attacked us, and 
thus sealed her own doom. 

"We then concluded an agreement with our allies, 
which established in a most definite manner the right 
of Russia to the straits and Constantinople. Russians 
should know for what they are shedding blood, and, 
in accord with our allies, announcement is made to-day 
of this agreement from this tribunal. 

"Absolute agreement on this point is firmly estab- 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 263 

lished among the Allies, and there is no doubt that after 
she has obtained sovereign possession of a free passage 
into the Mediterranean, Russia will grant freedom of 
navigation for the Rumanian flag which now, not for 
the first time, floats in battle side by side with the flag 
of Russia." 

In this direction alone lies the hope of advancement 
for Russia. She has become leagued with Japan in 
the Far East, but Japan controls the whiphand and 
the ports. She has been driven back from all but a 
small strip on the Baltic, with Germany always in con- 
trol of traffic and the seas there even before the war. 
Moreover, the Russian people want Constantinople be- 
cause it is the birthplace of their faith and ideals — they 
want it with just the same intense longing that Roman 
Catholics would want Rome were Rome in Moslem 
hands, and as Americans would battle for Independence 
Hall were it the office of a German Governor General. 

Summing up, then, the manifest destinies of Rus- 
sia as they appear : ( 1 ) Russia must maintain cordial 
relations with Japan in order that a balance of power 
be preserved in the Far East and in order that her trade 
— and fully one-third of her trade goes through Japan- 
ese ports — be unrestricted. (2) That Russia attains 
Constantinople in order that she may have an ice-free 
port the year round and in order that the prayers and 
hopes of her people for centuries may be answered. 
(3) That she do her share in establishing "a united, 
independent and autonomous Poland." (4) That she 
stands by ready to preserve, as she has done before, the 
integrity and independence of the smaller Balkan 
States. 



264 TH E RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

VII 

A great many Americans are more concerned with 
the internal destinies of Russia than they are with the 
part she is eventually to play in the concert of the 
world's powers. To put this interest in the form of 
the questions that are generally asked, we have the 
following: 

"What chance have the Russian people to gain a 
greater voice in their own self-government ?" 

"What chance is there for a better treatment of the 
Jews'?" 

I believe that there will be no bloody revolution in 
Russia so long as the German influence can be kept in 
check. A "bloodless revolution" is in sight, and that 
the world has witnessed from the beginning of the 
war. The fight between the Douma and the bureau- 
cracy has not been a fight between the bureaucrats 
per se and the people, but a contest between the pro- 
Germans and the Russian people for the control of 
their government in the management of this war. So 
long as Germany can command the unrest of the Rus- 
sian people, it holds Russia helpless. The continuation 
of bureaucratic rule in Russia works to the advantage 
of Germany and the worst defeat Germany has suf- 
fered was the attainment of the Russian people to the 
control of their own internal affairs in March, 1917. 

On the other hand there exists in Russia a condi- 
tion that causes doubt; are the Russian people as 
yet in a position to govern themselves'? It is easy 
enough for socialistic writers to spill gallons of vituper- 
ous ink over the situation in Russia; the fact remains 
that until the masses are better educated, until there 



RUSSIA'S MANIFEST DESTINIES 265 

arises a greater industrial class, until education becomes 
more universal and more available, it is useless to speak 
of The Republic of Russia, free and practicable. 
The present reign has accomplished more toward the 
attainment of freedom along these lines than any pre- 
vious regime, and the improvement has been due to the 
efforts of the people in their Zemstvos and Municipal- 
ity Unions, and through the solidarity of the people 
against the corrupt pro-German bureaucracy. 

The Jewish situation unquestionably constitutes one 
of those evils that Russia will soon crush. Revo- 
lution will bring this reform — although the powers in 
Russia are not forgetting that in the last Revolution, 
40% of the revolutionists were Jews and in some dis- 
tricts it ran up to 90%. x The reform will come quickly 
when it does come, just as the freeing of the serfs 
was accomplished quickly and the freeing of the peo- 
ple from the bondage of drink was done over night. 

We have our parallels here. In the lynching 
and race riots we have American practices that are 
quite comparable to the Russian pogrom, just as our 
"pork" is the American equivalent for the Rus- 
sian bureaucrat's "graft." And just as the high- 
minded Americans blush for the inhuman discrimina- 
tion against the negro and the vicious attacks on his 
race, so do high-minded Russians blush for the Pale 
and the pogrom. So long as we permit these evils to 
exist, we have no ground for criticizing Russia. Were 
the negro race a race of bankers and did they hold the 
purse-strings of the world, America would doubtless 
be in the same unfortunate light that Russia stands 

1 Vide An Economic History of Russia by James Mavor,_ Vol. II, 
Page 210. Professor Mavor is quoting von Plehve, the Minister of 
the Interior, and agrees with his figures. 



266 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

to-day. Because Russia insists on managing her Jew- 
ish population as she wishes, America cannot sign a 
commercial treaty with her to-day, and so long as she 
maintains that attitude she will not. 

In considering both these matters — the political free- 
dom of the people and the Jewish situation — it is well 
to remember that the situation in Russia is not the situ- 
ation that exists in the United States, and that it is 
wholly unfair to Russia to judge her solely on the basis 
of American history or American customs. 

In the abolition of the vodka traffic Russia has taken 
the greatest stride forward since the abolition of serf- 
dom. Even the establishment of the Douma in nowise 
compares with it. To-day the Russian in the street has 
a clear head and a bit of money in his purse. He is 
sober now, and thinks; he has the wherewithal to pur- 
chase and has become a potential consumer. And in 
becoming a potential consumer he has also attained the 
plane of a potential citizen. 

We in America who are inclined to look for drastic 
reforms must remember that the recent revolt of the 
leaders of the people is more against the German ele- 
ment in high places than against the concept of rule 
from above. Russia will need some figurehead to 
which the vast populace can look up. It is not pre- 
pared for the republican form of government as yet. 
It is just growing up to that state. The people have 
cleansed the old house. We must not require of them 
that they immediately build a new one. 



CHAPTER XIV 

RUSSIA AND AMERICA 

AMERICA and Russia stand at opposite poles. 
Officially, no two nations under the sun could 
be farther apart. Between the Governments 
exist no apparent bond of sympathy, no common inter- 
ests, no tangible ground of understanding — not even a 
commercial treaty. In spite of this disparity there can 
be found between the Russian people and the people 
of the United States a parallel that makes us almost 
kin. For in the mind of almost every Russian is an 
inherent sense of democracy, and a desire for 
democracy. 

Among the Russian people — the folk who labor and 
fight and loaf and love — is to be found cordiality and 
tolerance one would scarcely expect in a nation where 
class lines are so closely drawn. There is also a free- 
dom of the individual as an individual which is quite 
contrary to the conceptions one has of life in Russia. 

The tolerance may be brusque, but the cordiality will 
invariably be poetic. The captain orders his men to 
face certain death with him and calls them "Little 
Doves" — golubchiks — as he does it. The isvostik 
will thrash his poor old horse and call him "Little 
Dove" while the blows are falling fastest ! 

The social snob is an unknown quantity in Russia. 
This, for the simple reason that the classes are 

267 



268 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

so far apart. One does not snub one's servants, 
and one would not think of trying to snub a moujik. 
It would be like snubbing a horse or a lovable dog. In 
all walks of life this democracy is evident; you find 
it in the army, in the church, in the schools, in the mar- 
ket stalls, everywhere. The Russian understands the 
classes beneath him. 

Even taking into account the fact that human nature 
is the same in all ages and all peoples — verily it is the 
touchstone of the world! — the Russian expression of 
human nature is more akin to the American than it is 
to the British. This works out in devious ways — the 
rise of self-made men to positions of influence and 
honor, an instinctive appreciation of the arts, an im- 
pressionable religious sense, and a patriotism wholly 
voluntary and spontaneous. Russia "of the people and 
by the people" is very much "for the people." 

It were futile to say that we will understand the 
Russian better now that his Government is more liberal. 
China has had a republic for well-nigh a decade, and 
we neither know nor care more about the Chinese now 
than we did, save as they appeal to us as possible con- 
sumers of our wares. Perhaps it is the fact that our 
Governments have been so very different which gives 
us a basis for understanding the Russ. 

Our official paths have crossed but little : the marks 
of sympathy in the Civil War, the sale of Alaska, and 
the abrogation of our commercial treaty. America has 
proved a safe harbor for fleeing administrative exiles, 
much as have England and France. No, it is not on 
the basis of Governmental and diplomatic relations 
that we can come to understand the Russian. Yet we 
are understanding him more and more each day. 



RUSSIA AND AMERICA 269 

It is remarkable that our misconceptions about Rus- 
sia should be dispelled, not by denials issued by the 
Russian Government, but by the very affirmative power 
of the Russian people as expressed in the various phases 
of their arts. Russian music, the Russian dance, the 
Russian novel — these have entered in where diplomats 
feared to tread, entered in and found a home. The 
things that have sprung from the soul of Russia have 
awakened a sympathy in the soul of America. Our 
harmonies with Russia are harmonies of color, of line, 
of tone and of rhythm. 

Other international relationships invariably find 
foundation in things different from these. The blood 
of the English flows in the veins of many of us. We 
speak her tongue and are beholden to her for many of 
our laws and customs. She has been a mother — not 
always kindly, not always faithful, but a mother just 
the same. France holds us in her eternal debt for the 
concept of political freedom, for the graciousness -we 
would possess, for the brilliant spirit we would make 
our own and for the men who have willingly lived their 
lives in the cause of America. To both of these nations 
we have been bound by commerce for many years. The 
foundation and superstructure of those friendships are 
in barter and trade. 

The relations between the Russian people and the 
American show quite a different basis. From a cloud 
of prejudice we are gradually emerging into the clearer 
light of an understanding. And we are being drawn 
there not by commerce, but by an appreciation of those 
good things the Russian people have to offer. Here 
are hands stretched across the seas bringing things more 
tangible than gold, more lasting than business. Here 



270 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

we can see the soul of Russia awakening the soul of 
America to those matters that are more important than 
money — those things for which no nation than America 
stands in greater need — the things of the spirit. 

In the last analysis the question is not, "What have 
Russia and America in common 1 ?" but "What have the 
Russian people to give the American, and what the 
American to give the Russian?" 

For some years America has been lingering at the 
crossroads. We would seem to be undecided as to 
which path to take. We have noble traditions to live 
up to and evil traditions to live down. Slowly the 
whole order is changing. We are awakening to some 
very solemn facts. We are learning that a nation can 
gain the whole world and lose its soul, that without 
faith no culture can exist, that no people can advance 
without some idee fixe. 

With one exception, the wars America has fought 
have been wars of liberation. But — and mark this 
point — no sooner has she concluded such a war than 
the ideals of liberation have been completely laid aside 
and she has plunged herself into business again. Lib- 
eration is not the idee fixe of the American people ; busi- 
ness is. And in business America leads the world. She 
lost her chance at the title of liberator when she failed 
to speak out for Belgium and for those who went down 
with the Lusitania — her own flesh and blood. But in 
business she can point a new way, and perhaps by this 
she may gain salvation. 

Business, as we now understand it in America, means 
service. The corporation that builds a railroad builds 
it for service, the man who publishes a magazine pub- 
lishes it for service, the woman who enters business life 



RUSSIA AND AMERICA 271 

enters to serve others. Let this corporation, this pub- 
lisher, this woman try to labor without that ideal of 
service, and they are doomed to failure. In other 
words, business in America has come to be conducted 
"by the people and for the people." 

This is one of the greatest ideals we can carry to 
Russia to-day. Let our business men, who are seeking 
out markets there, remember this. Russia knows as 
well as America the lessons of political freedom on 
which this Government is based. Montesquieu and 
Marx were read by the people of Russia more than they 
were read by Americans. But our concept of commerce 
based on service is an ideal still to be raised in the Slav 
Empire. 

In return, America can learn from Russia the value 
of cooperation. Freedom can be had for the asking 
in America; in Russia it was not to be had without 
fighting, and those who fought side by side have learned 
to labor side and side for their mutual interests and 
advantages. To dream of the artel in America would 
be wildly fantastic, but we are gradually acquiring a 
more active spirit of cooperation that may result in 
some of the good the artel in Russia has accomplished. 

Let America teach Russia the human side of its dol- 
lar dynamics and, to pay the debt, Russia can teach 
America the value of class cooperation. 

In the liveliness of their religious sense I believe that 
Russia and America are about equals. At all events 
one finds in no nation such a spirit of true religion, 
working seven days a week, as he finds here in America 
and yonder in Russia. Our faiths are separated by a 
great gulf, but they converge in an infinity of ideals. 

The Russian is a crusader. He has always been 



272 THE RUSSIANS: AN INTERPRETATION 

a crusader. To him Jerusalem is very real. It is an 
actual city that he goes up to. It is a place where he 
falls down upon his knees and on whose worn pave- 
stones he imprints the kiss of fealty. For that reason 
Russian pilgrims in thousands journey each year to the 
Holy Lands. ... In America, Jerusalem is an idea, a 
concept, a symbol. It requires a vast amount of mental 
journeyings to arrive there and perhaps a straining of 
the mental eye to behold it. But when we attain to the 
height whence it can be seen, we hold it in high regard. 
For this reason the American who actually goes up to 
Jerusalem is a rarity. In the past our Jerusalems have 
been hills of human wrong. Some day, when we shall 
have recovered our old ideals, Americans may journey 
thither again with swords unsheathed and armor glis- 
tening. 

Crusading presupposes courage. 

"It would be interesting to know what it is men are 
most afraid of," remarks Raskolnikov in Crime and 
Punishment. "Taking a new step, uttering a new word 
is what they are most afraid of." Yes, that and the 
dread most of us have of merging our insignificant 
selves into a common cause. 

Our unlimited democracy has formed us into a na- 
tion of individual units; Russia's unlimited autocracy 
has moulded her people into masses. 

The man in the street in Russia has had kept before 
him, either by his class or his Government, certain 
ideals not to be forgotten. They are the ideal of na- 
tionalism — the divine calling of his Russia; the ideal 
of his faith — the "Faith that will overcome the world" ; 
the ideal of his individual sacrifice for the good of the 
race. 



RUSSIA AND AMERICA 273 

In the last analysis, the facts of Russia are mainly- 
spiritual facts and the facts of America are mainly 
material facts. That is why America is so easy to define 
and Russia so difficult. Tiutchev spoke a solemn truth 
when he wrote : 

You cannot understand Russia by the intelligence ; 
You cannot measure her by the ordinary footrule ; 
She has her own peculiar conformation ; 
You can only believe in Russia. 



INDEX 



Absolutism, analysis of, 43 
beginnings of, 44 
of eastern origin, 44 
some advantages of, 42, 43 

Agents provocateur, activities of, 

73 
Agricultural Schools and Experi- 
ment stations, 68 
Alexander I, love for Germans, 83 
Alexander II, freeing of serfs by, 

48 
Alexander III, establishes 
Zemstvos, 48 
German colonization under, 84 
Alexandrovsk, 145 
Altai Railway, Siberia, 229 
America, and Russian trade, 132 
beginnings of an understanding 

of Russia in, 269 
democratic parallel with Rus- 
sia, 267 
few official points of contact 

with Russia, 268 
foundation of French friend- 
ship with, 269 
foundations of international re- 
lationships, 269 
relations with England, 269 
religious ideals a parallel with 

Russia's, 271 
Russian arts dispel American 

misconceptions, 269 
service as an ideal in, 270 
the lesson of Russian coopera- 
tion to, 271 



American harvesters in Russia, 

159 
American misconceptions of Rus- 
sia, 2, 3, 4 
American-Russian Chamber of 

Commerce, 134 
Ann, Empress, patron of the 

ballet, 224 
Archangel, 145 
Arensky, 3 

Armenians, treacherous charac- 
teristics of, 40 n 
Artels, 149 

a Russian's comparison of, 

with labor unions, 151 
communistic bands, 14 
communistic rules of, 150 
cooperation, the keynote of, 152 
Art in Russia, 197, 208 
architecture, classical, 204 
architecture, ecclesiastical, 205 
architecture, French and 

Italian influence, 205 
as applied to furniture, 207 
Bihbin, book-illustrator, 205 
book-illustrating, 205 
Byzantine influence in early 

frescoes, 202 
church decoration, the first 

form of, 198 
Davydov, book-illustrator, 205 
Dutch and Danish influence on 

frescoes, 203 
Greek frescoes at Kiev, 203 
Korovin, book-illustrator, 205 



275 



276 



INDEX 



Art in Russia, ikons, beginning of, 
ecclesiastical, 199 

interest of intellig entia in, 208 

making of ikons a peasant in- 
dustry, 202 

Michael Nesterov, fresco 
painter, 204 

moujik's passion for gaudy 
colors, 205 

moujik's skill in toy-making, 
206 

national individuality of eccle- 
siastical, 204 

painting of ikons, 199 

Polyenov, Miss, book-illustra- 
tor, 205 

Rosa Newmarch, 201 n 

Roubliev, early fresco artist, 
203 

Russian development in 
frescoes, 203 

secular, religious and ecclesias- 
tical, 197 

Tsars, patrons of, 208 

Vasnietsov, Victor, fresco artist, 
204 

Verestschagin, 198 

Vrubel, ikon painter, 204 

Bakst, 225 

Balakirev, folk song, collection 
of, 213 n 

Balkans, political wheels within 
wheels, 249 

Barck, M., 148 

Bayarstvo, landowning aristoc- 
racy, 25 

Beggardom as an institution, 166 

Beggars, analysis of Russian, 
167, 168 
encouraged by clergy, 170 
the Kremlin variety a pick- 
pocket, 170 



Berenovsky, church music com- 
poser, 216 

Bieloruss (White Russian), char- 
acteristics of, 33 

Biron, Empress Ann's German 
favorite, 83 

Blagowestchensk, 149, 152, 230, 

235 
Bortniansky, Palestrina of Rus- 
sia, 216 
Bureaucracy, 50 
a necessity, 16 
and "graft," 76 
need for, 63 
Business, American methods of 
acquiring foreign, 132 
bankruptcy in Russia, 140 
bribery rampant in Russia in, 

138 
complicated bank methods, 136 
floating a Russian loan, 141 
French influence in Russia, 

143 
German commercial methods, 

132 
German control of Russian, 

141 
German exports to Russia, 142 
graft in Trans-Siberian Rail- 
way, 139 
grafters' naive explanation, 139 
"graft's" punishment of Tomsk, 

139 

increase in industry during 
war, 144 

increased railroad mileage, 144 

installment sales, 140 

Jewish monetary influence anti- 
Russian, 141 

lack of winter port, 145 

long credits in Russia, 135 

need for study of Russian mar- 
ket, 134 



INDEX 



277 



Business, Oriental methods in 

Russian dealing, 135 
railroad monopoly, 147 
Russian and American methods 

contrasted, 138 
Russian butter in New York, 

146 
Russia's need of commerce, 146 
social methods of, in Russia, 

137 
sugar industry in Russia, 147 
tea consumption in Russia, 148 
unlikelihood of Russia's re- 
pudiating debts, 143 
value of port of Alexandrovsk, 

H5 

what American exporters must 
learn, 133 

what Russia needs from 
America, 135 

why Americans lose to Ger- 
mans, 133 
Byron, Lord, apostle of Roman- 
ticism, 189 

influence of, in Russian litera- 
ture, 189 
Byzantium, 22, 26 

Cabinet Council, portfolios of, 

49 

Catherine the Great, favors Ger- 
mans, 83 
Russian control of affairs 
under, 48 

Censor, the, 50 

Censorship, stupid methods of, 74 

Chesterton, Gilbert, on Russian 
literature, 185 

Chozars, emigrate to Russia, 24 
introduce commerce on the 
steppes, 24 

Christianity, beginnings of, in Rus- 
sia, 26 



Church, the, 50 
opposes popular education, 70 
vast land holdings of, 69 
Classes recognized by law, 6 
Clergy, classes of priesthood, 

104 
Consumers' League, Petrograd's 

successful, 161 
Cooperative Societies, Govern- 
ment financial aid to, 162- 
164 
rural credit system and, 162 
Russian and American com- 
pared, 160 
statistics of, 160 
Cossacks {Kazak), affiliate with 
Russians, 36 
classification of, 37 
curious military "retreat" of, 

35 
defeat Tartars at Omsk, 37 
fighting proclivities of, 36 
organize the Zaporogian 

Setcha, 35 
origin of, 34 

rights and privileges of, 37 
training of, 37 

Tsarevitch chief Ataman of, 37 
Crasnoyarsk, 235 
Cui, Cesar, musical iconoclast, 

218 
on Glinka's Life for the Tsar, 

217 
on Russian folk songs, 213 

Dalny, Orthodox Cathedral at, 

100 
"Devil Chase, The," 11 n 
Diaghileff, 197 
Digby, Bassett, Through Siberia, 

an Empire in the Making, 

231 n, quoted 241 
Domovoi (house fairies), 123 



278 



INDEX 



Dostoevsky and some others, 177- 
196 

analysis of literary style of, 177 

creed of, 181 

Crime and Punishment, 183 

early life of, 180 

epitome of Russian soul, 178 

gives orthodox advice, 182 

his novels are diaries, 180 

in exile, 181 

Insult and Injury, 180 

on Absolute Beauty, 188, 189 

Poor Folk, 180 

quoted, 184 

realism of, 183 

Russian apostle of realism, 184 

study of his characters, 183 

sui generis, 179 

The Brothers Karamazov, 180 

The Gambler, 180 

The Genius, 183 

The Idiot, 184 
"Doss" houses of Moscow, 166 
Doukoboors, 125 
Duncan, Isadora, 225 

Economic History of Russia, 

Mavor, quoted, 55 
Edict of Toleration (1905), 93, 

125 
Education, cost of, in Russia, 62 
opposition to, by Church, 70 
recent growth of, in Russia, 62 
school attendance, 62 
England, beneficial influences of, 
in Far East, 256 
new amity between, and Rus- 
sia, 255 
willing that Russia possess 
Constantinople, 255 
Ethnology of Russia, 31 

Fersoova, 149 
Finland, 39 



Fokine, M., Director of Ballet, 

225 
Folk songs of Russia, 211 
France, a financial power in Rus- 
sia, 143 

Germany, ambitious policies of, 
247 

colonization of, under Alex- 
ander III, 84 

control of Russian industries 
by, 141 

control of Sazanov, 248 

exports to Russia from, 142 

growth of influence of, under 
Empress Ann, 83 

influence of, in Russia disclosed 
by war, 86 

influence of, in Russian foreign 
affairs, 248 

influence of, on Russian life, 
25, 82 

influence of, on Russian rulers, 
82-85 

merchants of, in Russia, 142 

misplaced confidence in her in- 
fluence over Russia, 248 

political mistakes of, in Rus- 
sia, 143 

Russian press controlled by, 85 

systematic colonization by, 84 
Glazounov, 225 
Glinka, A Life for the Tsar, 217 

founder of Russian School of 
Music, 218 

Russian and Lioudmilla, 219 
Gogol, 3 
Gordhon, M., on peasants, 152, 

154 
Gorky, Maxim, 3 

analysis of characters of, 192 
apostle of physical activity, 190 
decline in popularity of, 193 



INDEX 



279 



Gorky, Maxim, glorifier of ac- 
tion in crime, 191 
The Confession, 192 
The Smug Citizen, 192 
Thomas Gordeyev, 192 
Goudonov, Boris, establishes serf- 
dom, 46 
policies of, 45 
Government and country, distinc- 
tions between, 4 
Government of Administrative 

Districts, 50 
Graham, Stephen, quoted, 113 n 
With Poor Immigrants in 
America, 193 n 
Great Russia, native character- 
istics, 33 

Hapgood, Isabel Florence, The 
Epic Songs of Russia, 212 n 
History of Russia, V. O. Kluchev- 
sky, quoted, 90 

Ikons, costly example in Moscow 
cathedral, 202 
importance of, in Russian life, 

200 
manufacture of, a peasant in- 
dustry, 202 
not a symbol, but a reality to 
the peasant, 119 
Illiterates, percentage of, 62 
Imperial Council (Gosudar- 
stivenni Sovet) t created, 

48 
functions of, 52 

membership of, 51 

organization of, 51 
Imperial Douma (Gosudar- 
stivenni Douma), a training 
school for politicians, 57 

causes of lack of progress, 56 

composition of, 53 



Imperial Douma, creation of, due 
to revolt of 1905, 54 
established, 48 
estimate of its work, 55 
functions of, 52, 53 
power of Imperial Council and 

Senate over, 61 
power of Tsar over, 56 
the hope of Russia, 57 
Tsar's power over, finds Amer- 
ican parallels, 56 
Individual freedom, 2 
Industries, recent rapid growth 

of, 153 
statistics of, 165 
Infantile mortality, 66 
Intelligentia, causes of discontent 
of, 71 
characteristics of, 7, 8 
Irkutsk, Siberian administrative 

capital, 235 
Ivan III, assumes absolute au- 
thority, 45 
defeats the Tartars, 30 
first to bear title of Tsar, 

23 
Ivan IV (The Terrible), as a 
friend to his people, 45 
as a music patron and com- 
poser, 216 

Japan, ceded control of part of 
Manchuria, 251 
ceded remaining half of Sag- 

halien, 251 
territorial gains through 
European war, 253 
Jaroslav, 157, 159 
Jew, the, and public schools, 77 
and the Pale, 78 
as a political and economic 

factor, j6 
classified as a foreigner, 77 



280 



INDEX 



Jew, the, discrimination against, 

77 
large percentage of, in Russian 

revolutions, 265 
permitted residence places for, 

78 
Russian dislike for, 76 
Russia's debt to, 80 
Jewish question, exaggeration of 

importance of, 80, 81 

Kaluga, 156 

Kansk, 164 

Karamsin, on origin of Slavs, 

22 n 
Kazak (Cossack), origin of, 34 
Khirov Rinok, abject misery in, 

173 
beggar's lodging-houses, 171 
Kiev, 10, 23, 26 
downfall of, 29 
rebuilding of, 31 
Schism of, 28 
slavery in, 28 
Kirilov Monastery, Vrudel's 

ikons in, 204 
Kluchevsky, V. O., quoted, 27 n 
Kolchugino Railway, Siberia, 230 
Kostomiarov, N., on religious in- 
difference of the moujik, 

"5 
Kostroma, 157, 158, 159 
Kouzmine's, The Wings, 195 
Kremlin, beggars at the, 168 

view from ramparts, 171 
Kulundin Railway, Siberia, 230 
Kuprin, 194 
Kursk Government, 157 
Kustarny (Cottage industry), 152 

art work of, 153 

Government handicraft schools, 
156 

handicraft work of, 14 



Kustarny (Cottage Industry), 
main products of, 156 
statistics of, 156, 157, 158, 159 

Labor, Government's attitude to- 
ward, 72 

Laws, beginnings of, in Russia, 
28 

Leskov, Nicholas, The Devil 
Chase, n n 

Liberalism, rapid growth of, 75 

Literature, Russian, an index of 
self-freedom, 195 
Russia's decadence in, 195 

Little Russia (Malaia Roosia), 
31, dialects of, 32 
native characteristics, 32 
Ukrainian tongue not taught in 
schools, 32 

London, Jack, apostle of brute 
force, 189 
favorite foreign author in Rus- 
sia, 190 

Lunn, Mayor, 161 

Mamine, 190 n 

Manchuria, the Orthodox church 

in, 98 
Mashkova Suren, 69 
Mavor, James, An Economic His- 
tory of Russia, 55, 265 n 
Miami, Ohio, ref., 113 
Mikailovich, Tsar Alexis, moral- 
ity plays under patronage of, 
216 
Minusinsk, 164 

Mongol invasion of Russia, 29 
Moscovy, regenerated, 30 
Moscow, io, 159 

Angelus, a cacophony, 171 
beggars at the Kremlin, 168 
beggars of, 166 
"doss" houses of, 166 



INDEX 



281 



Moscow, "Flea Market" of beg- 
gardom, 173 
Khirov Rinok, a disease-breed- 
ing place, 173 
methods of Russian thug, 173 
successor to Kiev, 29 
the Kremlin beggar a pick- 
pocket, 170 
Moujik, absence of unbelief 
among, 128 
a socialist and revolutionist, 13 
attitude toward death, 113 
capacity for pity, 12 
causes of his revolt, 67 
characteristics of, 9 
class suffering of the, n 
compared with peasant of 

Orient and Occident, 9 
contrasted with Puritans, 

129 
death his gateway to life, 118, 

119 
desires of, 15 
Devil, his notion of, 122 
devotion of, to the Cross, 114 
distrust of the Jew, 68 
dual nature of, 118 
Eastern fatalism of, 119 
economic problems of, 67 
fairies and sprites real to the, 

123 
gregarious and clannish, 13 
grievances against the Church, 

69 
Heaven and Hell, conception 

of, 122 
his love for the Tsar, 17 
his notion of the Trinity, 121 
idolatrous regard for ikons, 120 
interest of, in the Crucifixion 

and resurrection, 128 
irreligion of, in youth, 114, 
"5 



Moujik, life in Siberia, 18 
loss of working time through 

Church feast days, 69 
muddled religious ideas of, 121 
pagan customs among, 13, 123 
patience of, 15 
preparation for death, 117 
prosperity of, through war, 71 
religion of, 10, 11, 12, 112-130 
religion the foundation of his 

life, 130 
religious pilgrimages of, 116 
superstitions of, 123, 124 
the strength of Russia, 9 
unlucky working days, 123 
unshaken faith of, 128 
why his revolts fail, 16 
Mullakons, 125, 126, 127 
Music in Russia, 209-226 
Balakirev, 218 
ballets before court of Peter 

the Great, 223 
Bereyovsky, church music com- 
poser, 216 
Borodin, 218 

Bortniansky, church music com- 
poser, 216 
bylinas, epic songs, 212 
Byzantine and Greek influence 

in church music, 215 
ceremonial songs, 212 
characterization of Tchai- 
kovsky's compositions, 221 
Church's opposition to folk 

songs, 212 
classification of folk songs, 

214 
on Russian folk songs, 213, 218 
Empress Elizabeth's strenuous 

support of music, 217 n 
Fokine, M., Director of Ballet, 

225 
folk dances, 223 



282 



INDEX 



Music in Russia, folk songs, en- 
vironmental influence, 211 
generous support of music by 

Tsars and Empresses, 217 
Glinka, founder of Russian 

School of Music, 218 
Glinka's A Life for the Tsar 
revolutionizes Russian music, 
217 
Glinka's Russian and Lioud- 

milla, 219 
Imperial Ballet, 224 
Imperial Chapel choir, 216 
Ivan the Terrible as a com- 
poser, 216 
Kalyeky Perekozhie, itinerant 

psalm singers, 213 
modern ballet not a folk dance, 

222 
Moguchaya Kiuchka, "The 

Mighty Group," 218 
morality of native dances, 222 
morality plays and music in 

17th century, 216 
Moussorgsky, 218, 219 
pantomime dancing, 225 
Peter the Great organizes first 

body of musicians, 216 
revival of interest in folk 

songs, 215 
Rimsky-Korsakov, 218, 219 
Rubinstein, genius of, 219 
Russians as naturally musical 

as Germans, 210 
St. John, of Damascus, system- 
atizes church music, 215 
Tchaikovsky, genius of, 219 
Tchaikovsky, influence of 

Italian School on, 220 
Tchaikovsky, Peter Ilich, fe- 
cundity as a composer, 220 
Ukraine supplies finest singers, 
212 



Music in Russia, Wiener's claim 
of American source of inter- 
est in folk songs, 215 

National characteristics not read- 
ily understood, 2 

Nesselrode, Alexander's German 
Foreign Minister, 84 

Nesterov, Michael, fresco painter, 
204 

Newmarch, Rosa, on ikon paint- 
ers, 200 

Newspapers, censorship and, 74 
Russian and American com- 
pared, 74 

Nicholas, Grand Duke, famous 
retreat of, 255 
the politics of, transfer to 
Caucasus of, 255 

Nicholas I adopts German 
methods, 84 

Nihilism, futility of sporadic, 
86 

Nikon, Patriarch of Moscow, 
standardizes church ritual, 
91, 124 

Nijni Novgorod, 157 

Nobility, hereditary, how at- 
tained, 6 
numbers of, 6 
personal, 6 
Teutonic influence on, 7 

Nomadic characteristics, 45 

Novgorod, 23, 33, 44 

Omsk, 164, 235 
Orenburg, 159 
Orthodox Church, the, 89 

beauty of edifices, 101 

black popes, 104 

cathedral at Dalny lost to Jap- 
anese, 100 

classes in priesthood, 104 



INDEX 



283 



Orthodox Church, connection with 

state in time of Peter the 

Great, 89 
elastic theology of, 120 
enmity between black and 

white popes, 105 
exercises Eastern influence on 

State, 90 
failure of plans of, through 

military defeat, 99 
first schism in, 124 
heretical sects, 125 
Holy Synod, 105 

composition of, 92 

established, 92 
in 17th century, 90 
interdependence of spiritual 

and military conquests, 96, 

101 
missionaries in Manchuria, 

98 
Mullakons, 125, 126 
music of, 103 
on the frontier, 96 
Oriental elements of, 120 
political activities of, 95 
present reforms in the, 94 
probable evolution in, 93 
profound piety of worshippers, 

1 01 
schism in, 91 
schools of, 95 

three divisions of edifice, 102 
wealth of, 93 

white pope, a register of vital 
statistics, 106 

compensations in hard life 
of, III 

duties of, 104, 105 

held in contempt by nobility, 
107 

obligatory marriage of, 108 

precarious living of, 109 



Orthodox Church, white pope, 
raising of educational re- 
quirements of, 107 
small stipend of, 106 

Pale, the, 78 

New York parallel of, 78 
Pavlova, 158 

Peasant,migratoryhabitsofthe,i65 
some causes of unrest of, 165 
the banker's view of the, 152 
the peasant's view of the, 151 
urban worker in winter, farmer 
in summer, 154 
Peter the Great, coming of for- 
eigners under, 81 
enlists foreign teachers, 47 
establishes the Holy Synod, 92 
organizes first body of musi- 
cians, 216 
patron of the ballet, 223 
reforms of, 47 
Petrograd, 10 

Philaret, Patriarch, forbids stat- 
ues in Russian churches, 199 
Pogodin, on origin of Slavs, 22 n 
Pogrom, compared to American 
lynching, 80 
definition of, 79 
not necessarily anti-Jewish, 79 
Politics, a post-bellum prediction, 
257 
Balkan States, Russia ready to 

preserve integrity of, 263 
changed policy of England to- 
ward Russia, 255 
commercial jealousies of 
Russia and Japan in Man- 
churia, 252 
Constantinople, value of, to 

Russia, 261 
control of northern Far East 
by Russia and Japan, 257 



284 



INDEX 



Politics, England's accomplish- 
ments in Far East, 256 

England willing Russia should 
possess Constantinople, 255 

European war prevents an 
Eastern conflict, 253 

future foreign policy of United 
States, 258 

German and Russian influence 
in Poland, 260 

Germany's Asiatic losses to 
Japan, 253 

Germany's paper kingdom of 
Poland, 259 

Japan, necessity for cordial re- 
lations between Russia and, 
263 

Japan's territorial gains 
through war, 253 

Poland, German and Russian 
atrocities in, 259 

Poland Germany's gateway to 
Russia, 260 

Poland, the scapegoat of na- 
tions, 259 

Poland's destiny, 260 

political differences in Russia, 
40 

possible alignment of world 
powers after war, 257 

reasons for Grand Duke Nich- 
olas' transfer to Caucasus, 

2SS . 
remainder of Saghalien ceded 

to Japan as munitions pay- 
ments, 251 

Russia cedes portion of Man- 
churia to Japan, 251 

Russia, cooperation of Crown 
in education in, 265 

Russia, Jewish question in, 265 

Russia, people of not educated 
to self-governing point, 264 



Politics, Russian dream of south- 
ern expansion, 254 
Russian -pogroms and American 
race riots, parallel between, 
265 
Russian religion and part Asi- 
atic origin assets in Far East, 
257 
Russia's aims in the Trans- 
Caucasus, 253 
Russia's alliance with France 

and England, 248 
Russia's fateful change of atti- 
tude in Manchuria, 252 
Russia's hopes for southern ex- 
pansion, 254 
Russia's need of ice-free port, 

263 
Russia's share in establishing 

independent Poland, 263 
United States and League to 

Enforce Peace, 258 
vodka prohibition, results of, 
266 
Polotsk, 23 
Poltava, 158 
Poor Folk, Dostoevsky's first 

novel, 180 
Port Arthur, 98 
Potapenko's A Russian Priest, 

94 
Pratch, folk song collection' of, 

213 n 
Prohibition of vodka, 43 

benefits of since war began, 9 n 
effect on government finances, 

147 
liquor statistics, 147 n 
some effects of, 63 
to continue after war, 148 
Protestantism, growth of, in Rus- 
sia, 125 n 



INDEX 



285 



Prussian influence in Russo-Jap- 
anese War, 84 

Pskov, 23, 44 

Punishments, early, for violation 
of laws, 28 

Pushkin, quoted, 81 

Pyeshkov, Alexis Michaelevitch, 
Gorky's real name, 191 

Racial divisions in Russia, 40 
Railroads, completion of Amur, 
144 

double tracking of Trans-Si- 
berian, 144 

increased mileage during war, 
144 

mileage in Russia compared 
with other countries, 144 n 

Trans-Caspian, 144 
Raskolnikov, Crime and Punish- 
ment, quoted, 272 
Raskolniks (Old Believers), 91 

classes of, 125 
Rasputin, 194 n 
Religion, Edict of Toleration, 125 

Heaven and Hell according to 
the moujik, 122 

heretical sects in Russia, 125 

illogical religious prejudices, 
127 

influence of, in life of Rus- 
sians, 10, 11, 12 

Mullakons, 125, 126, 127 

of the moujik, 1 12-130 

Oriental influences in Orthodox 
Church, 120 

pagan customs among peasants, 
123 

peasants' idea of the Devil, the, 
122 

puritan and moujik compared, 
129 

the many diverse, of Russia, 40 



Religion, Trinity, the peasants' 
notion of, 121 
unbelief, absence of among 
peasants, 128 
Religions and political redivisions 

of 1 6th century, 46 
Reshetvokov, 190 n 
Revolt of 1905, causes of, 53 
Revolts, causes of failure of, 16 
Revolutions, causes of failure of, 
61 
lack of programs of, 87 
purposes of, 87 
results of, in Russia, 86 
Rimsky-Korsakov, 3, 213, 225 
Romanov, Mikail, elected em- 
peror by the people, 46, 49 
Rosen, Baron, anti-Russian policy 
of, 250 
pro-German, 249 
Roussalki (water nymphs), 123 
Rubinstein, Anton, genius of, 219 

on opinions of himself, 220 
Rurik, Russia's first ruler, 25 
Russia and America, 267-274 
Russia and Democracy, G. de 

Wesselitzky, quoted, 83 
Russia, American understanding 
of people of, 268 
attunement of soul of, with that 

of America, 269 
autocratic power of Emperor, 

42 
democratic spirit of people, 268 
foreign elements introduced in, 

24-26 
freeing of the serfs, 43 
individual freedom in, 267 
prohibition of vodka, 43 
the Russian a Crusader, 271 
tolerance and cordiality of peo- 
ple of, 267 
wheat fields of, 132 



286 



INDEX 



Russian, arms strengthened by 
defeat, 18 
as a working man, 149-176 
as business man, 1 31-148 
Land of Promise, 227-245 
piety, 107 
what is a, 20 
Russian Priest, A, Potapenko, 94 
Russian Review, The, quoted, 

162-164 
Russia's manifest destinies, 246- 
266 
points of contact with the 
world, 246 

Savings banks deposits, increase 
in, since prohibition, 70 
war's influence on, 70 
Sazanov, influenced by Germany, 

249 
Scandinavian growth in Russia, 

39 

Scenery, beauty of, 5 

Scholzer, A. V. von, on origin of 
Slavs, 2i n 

Secret Police, "The Third Divi- 
sion," 50 

Senate, constitution and duties of, 
50 

Self -Government in Russia, Vina- 
gradoff, 41 

Sergievo Monastery, Roubliev 
frescoes in, 203 

Shaman (Kalmuck medicine 
man), 124 

Siberia, Achinsk- Yensysk Rail- 
way, 239 
acquired by Russia, 39 
Akmolinsk-Spassky Copper 

Mines Railway, 238 
Altai Railway, 229 
an American idea of the Rus- 
sian gymnasium, 234 



Siberia, Blagowestchensk, mining 

and wheat center, 235 
bravest troops from, 17 
commercial life of, 234 
cooperative societies in, 243 
Crasnoyarsk, wheat and mining 

center, 235 
development analogous to our 

West, 240 
egg production, 235 
Ekaterinburg-Kurgan Railway, 

239 
exaggerated notions of climatic 

severity, 232 
farm products, statistics of, 236 
freedom in greater than in 

Russia, 17 
increase in population, 230 
Irkutsk, administrative capital, 

235 
Jew in, the, 242 
Kolchugino Railway, 230 
Kulundin Railway, 230 
liberal government help for 

settlers, 241 
mineral resources, 239 
mineral statistics, 236 
native of, compared with our 

westerner, 235 
need of capital for develop- 
ment, 239 
need of factories, 240 
no longer a prison land, 231 
Omsk, butter, egg and meat 

products market, 235 
Petropavlovsk-Kokchetav Rail- 
way, 238 
projected railroads, 237, 238 
railroads and population, the 

need of, 237 
railways of, 229, 230 
religion of tribes of, 39 
rural schools in, 17 



INDEX 



287 



Siberia, Slavgorod-Semipalatinsk- 

Verny Railway, 238 
soil and rivers of, 227, 228 
solution of Russia's congestion 

problem, 244 
South Siberian Railway, 237 
Stretensk, mining outpost, 235 
Tcheliabinsk, a cattle town, 235 
Technology Institute, 18 
Tomsk, mining and university 

city, 235 
Tomsk University, 17 
vast possibilities of wheat 

fields of, 236 
vastness of, 227 
Vladivostok, Pacific port, 235 
wide variations in temperature, 

233 
Sienkiewicz's With Fire and 

Sword, 35 
Simeonofka, 157 
Slavery, in 12th century, 28 
Slavs, early religion of, 26 
early tribal government, 23 
of the Carpathians, 21 
of the Dnieper and Don, 22 
sources of the, 21 
von Tcholzer on origin of, 22 n 
Smolensk, 23 

Social strata, distinct cleavage of, 
6, 49 
nobles, 6 

the intellig entia, 7, 8 
the moujik, 8, 9 
Sologub, 194 

Soloviev, on origin of Slavs, 22 n 
Sports, absence of at Russian 

colleges, 73 
Starosta, leader of artels, 150 
Stepniak, on peasant notions of 

ikons, 120 
Stolypin, Premier, summary meth- 
ods of, 54 



Stolypin reforms, agricultural 
schools and experiment sta- 
tions, 68 
increase in acreage of public 
lands, 68 

St. Nicholas, 121 

St. Vladimir Church, Kiev, 10 

St. VI as, the Vol as of the 
pagans, 121 

Strikes, German-made, 65 n 

Strlyzic, 125 

Tchaikovsky, Peter Ilich, 3 

genius of, 219 
Tcheliabinsk, 235 
Tcherkesoff, W. T., quoted, 70 
Tchins, 6 

Technology Institute, Siberia, 18 
Teutonic influences, 7 
Teutonic political schemes, 247 
Third Division, activities of, 72 
Through Siberia, an Empire in 
the Making, Wright and 
Digby, quoted, 242 
Tolstoy, Count Dmitry, 3, 127 
a mingling of Orient and Occi- 
dent, 178 
conception of Absolute Beauty, 

189 
critical estimate of, 186 
efforts to lead moujik, 188 
enemy of Zemstovs, 59 
little influenced by orthodoxy, 

187 
loses prestige through rise of 

Dostoevsky, 188 
on moujik piety, 115 
wavers between influences of 
East and West, 186 
Tomsk, 139, 233, 235 

University of, 17 
Totomianz, Prof., on financial 
help to cooperative associa- 



288 



INDEX 



tions, 162, 164 
Trepov, on southern outlet to 

the sea, 262 
Tsar, head of both church and 
state, 49 
power of, over Douma, 56 
powers of, 49 
Tsarevitch, chief Ataman of Cos- 
sacks, 37 
Turgenev, 3 

as a writer, 178 
quoted, 273 
Tver Government, 157 
Tveratinov, Dmitri, 126 

Ufa, Moslem college at, 127 
Uspensky, 190 n 
quoted, no 

Variagians, protectors of trade 

routes, 25 
Vasnietsov, Victor, fresco painter, 

204 
Verestschagin, Russia's greatest 

artist, 197, 198 
Viatka, 158 
Vielkoruss (Great Russians), 

characteristics of, 33 
Vinagradoff, Prof., Self-Govern' 

merit in Russia, 41 
Vladimir, 156, 158, 159 
iconoclast, 199 
founding of city of, 29 
Prince of Kiev, 26, 27 
Vladivostok, 145, 235 
V Narodny Movement, 53 
Vodka, enormous income from 

sale of, 66 
Volas, the pagan counterpart of 

St. VI as, 121 
Vrubel, ikon painter, 204 

War, and social reforms, 63 
effect of, in industries, 88, 144 



War, effect of, on religious 
thought, 112 
effect on Russian ideal, 71 
reveals the astounding Ger- 
manization of Russia, 85 

Wesselitzky, G. de, Russia and 
Democracy, quoted, 83 

White Russians (Bieloruss) char- 
acteristics of, 33 

Wiener, Professor, An Interpre- 
tation of the Russian People, 
215 

Witte, Count, enemy of Zemstvos, 

59 
quoted, 72 
Wright (Richardson) and Digby 
(Bassett), Through Siberia, 
an Empire in the Making, 
231 n, quoted, 241 

Yermak, Cossack leader, 37 
Yermolov, General, 83 

Zemstvos, 6 

advocate prohibition, 66 

as aids to the Government, 59 

Assemblies of Governmental 
Districts, 58 

assist kustarny workshops, 156 

establish agricultural schools 
and farming credits, 68 

established by Alexander III, 
48, 58 

Executive Boards, 58 

growing power of, 60 

history of, 58 

offices of, 58 

power of governors and gov- 
ernors-general in, 61 

powers of, 58 

war activities of, 60 
Znakhar (witch doctor), 124 
Zwenigorod, 157 



v * 



\*$ - - %^ 



V </> 



& v ^ 



,s4 



■* 



V ., 




vOO. 






:!/ 



o o 






.". . 






A 





-4 -Tj 



Vv 4 






: / S " 



.0 c> 



<-■ 






fl 




O N 






9A 







A 






^ V* 



/, C • . V * 



G 






*> 



^0 o. 









%**' 



./' %, 



" 















o 



'a y- 



o o 



\- 



i* 



V?- 






/:■ 









A 1 



Neutralizing agent: Magnesium i 
Treatment Date: 



<*> 'ill' N 

Deacidified using the Bookkeeper proci 
Neutralizina aaent: Maqnesium Oxide 

2002 

PreservationTechnologi 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVAT 

111 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 1 6066 
(724)779-2111 






v 






V- 




7 c- 



v v * 






c, 



V N 















N, 



